Archive of Our Own

Minho woke up at dawn, as he’d done every day for several years now. It was a habit he’d been forced to adopt if he wanted to make the most of his days. A habit that was all the more useful as the days grew shorter with the approach of winter.

It was only at times like these that Minho felt free; just as the day was dawning, before the world came to life. 

His phone vibrated on the nightstand, and he frowned as he fumbled to grab it; receiving messages so early in the morning was something he wasn't used to.

from: sung-ah
Coffee near the clinic in 15 minutes?

If Jisung was already texting him at seven in the morning, he probably hadn't slept a wink all night.

He replied with a terse message of approval before stretching in his sheets to shake off the last remnants of sleep.

With his arms crossed under his head, he watched the first rays of dawn tinge the ceiling of his room. The silence of the early hours was only broken by the sound of water traveling through the radiator pipes under his window.

At the thought of seeing Jisung again soon, a small smile found its way onto Minho's lips.

It wasn't their habit to meet so early, especially with winter approaching. But today, Minho couldn't help but be grateful; he needed it. Probably just as much as Jisung did.

When he felt his strength returning, Minho slowly got up, dragging his feet to the bathroom. His movements were mechanical in the darkness he knew like the back of his hand: turning on the tap—water neither too cold nor too hot—and splashing his face, groping for a towel, before finally looking at his dark reflection in the mirror. 

His hair was tousled, which he tamed with a little water, and his shoulders were still hunched from waking up.

And that damn necklace resting against his throat, which he could never ignore.

Minho wished he could. Just for a day, or even an hour. But the weight of the steel against his collarbones, its constant coldness, and the intense reflection it cast in even the slightest light prevented him from doing so.

Sighing, Minho looked away from his reflection and returned to his room to get dressed.

As usual, he put on simple clothes. The same ones he wore almost every other day. Dark ones. A simple black shirt under an oversized black hoodie, a pair of jeans faded from overuse. 

Anonymous, reassuring. That way, no one would pay him too much attention, and he could avoid the indelicate stares directed at him.

Out of habit, Minho reflexively turned on the coffee maker when he got to the kitchen, before suddenly remembering that he didn't need it since he would get his fix when he met up with Jisung for said coffee. So he turned the brewer off and grabbed his keys from the counter.

The neighborhood was quiet when he finally stepped outside. 

Too quiet.

Minho was almost certain that if he stared hard enough at the windows of the surrounding houses, he could make out the silhouettes of neighbors watching him from behind their still-closed curtains.

He walked without stopping. Maintaining a pace that wouldn’t alarm those watching from the shadow but wouldn't make him appear suspicious either.

When he reached the corner of the street leading to the café, Minho noticed a patrol car parked there. A glance at his watch told him that he didn't have time to make a detour if he didn't want to be late to his meeting with Jisung.

His heart pounding in his chest, Minho continued on his way as if nothing had happened. The two officers in the vehicle tensed when they saw the metallic glint around his neck and stared at him.

Minho looked away and lowered his head.

Maintaining eye contact was too risky, and he preferred to avoid provoking the officers unnecessarily.

He felt nauseous as his path forced him to walk alongside the patrol car. Crossing the street would seem suspicious; the slightest insignificant thing could seem significant when you were an alpha.

His relief was only partial when he finally passed the vehicle. He could still feel the suspicious glances of the officers piercing holes in his back and it took all his willpower not to start running the last few feet that separated him from the front door of the establishment.

When Minho entered the café, his heart still pounding, Jisung was already waiting for him at their usual table with two large cups of steaming coffee. Seeing Jisung's face light up with a big smile when he saw him despite the redness of his eyes, Minho's heart skipped a beat.

The server standing behind the counter greeted Minho in a cheerful voice that died in his throat as soon as his gaze fell on the steel glinting around his neck. But it didn't matter. Not when Minho could guess the tears Jisung had shed before he joined him.

Minho crossed the room as quickly as he could, paying little attention to the stares of the other customers who seemed unable to take their eyes off him. Only Jisung mattered at that moment.

“Did you do the grand tour again today?” his best friend teased him before Minho even had time to sit down.

“Haha. Very funny, Jisung. You know very well that it's impossible in fifteen minutes,” he grumbled before taking a sip of his coffee.

The drink instantly warmed him, and he let out a sigh of contentment, closing his eyes to savor the moment.

“That's why I warned you at the last minute,” the younger man replied with a smirk before taking a sip of his own coffee.

“And you didn't sleep,” Minho countered, raising an eyebrow.

Jisung choked on his sip, coughing and spitting some of his coffee back into his mug. Minho handed him a paper towel with a smirk, delighted to have turned the situation to his advantage.

Jisung pouted. “I dreamed about my ceremony,” he whined as he wiped the corner of his mouth. “The flames turned pink and green and they announced I was a chicken before locking me in a hen pen.”

“At least you won't be exploited for your eggs,” Minho couldn't help but laugh.

Jisung, however, was not amused.

He simply stared at Minho with an expression that the latter still struggled to interpret, even though he had seen it on his friend's gentle face more than once.

Suddenly, a wave of heat spread through Minho, and he abruptly stopped laughing when the cold steel seemed to tighten around his throat.

Noticing that his friend had just touched his collar, Jisung couldn't help but ask, “Do you think you would have preferred to be an omega?”

“I don't know. But I'm glad it's me and not you.”

“We can't be sure, maybe I–”

Jisung's trembling voice died away before he could finish his sentence, as if the mere mention of the possibility was too awful for him. Minho's heart ached painfully in his chest at the sight of his friend's wet eyes.

“I just want to stay normal,” he continued, sniffing.

“You've never been normal, and it's not like that's going to change overnight, you know that,” Minho said in a last-ditch attempt to cheer him up.

Wiping away his tears before they had time to fall, a faint smile bloomed on Jisung's lips.

Now that it had cooled down a bit, he downed the rest of his coffee in one gulp and stood up abruptly. Then, asked timidly, “Would you mind walking me to work?” 

Minho nodded softly and stood up, following Jisung to the counter.

Without a word, Minho placed his card on the payment machine before Jisung could even grab his, as he always did. Jisung pouted, as he always did.

It was their habit. The way they existed together.

Outside the café, the wind had picked up. The first fallen leaves rolled across the road and sidewalk as gray clouds moved quickly overhead. 

Rain threatened.

Silently, they walked side by side without hurrying. Their arms brushed against each other without ever daring to touch, but Minho could feel Jisung's nervousness without even having to look at him.

Each mile that brought them closer to Jisung’s workplace passed quickly for Minho. However, he couldn't tell if Jisung felt the same way.

Jisung was the one who broke the measured silence between them. “You should go home after this,” he said cautiously.

“Why?” Minho asked.

Jisung seemed to hesitate for a moment.

“Just... you know, stay calm. Get some rest! You seem a little... tense.”

Minho shrugged. He understood only too well what Jisung hadn't even said out loud, just from the look in his eyes. He could see the latent terror shining there.

And Minho also knew that Jisung was right to be concerned.

He didn't have the freedom to be tense. The slightest change in his heart rate or body temperature, the slightest hormonal imbalance... and his collar would set off the alarm.

You couldn't afford to be tense when you were an alpha, because even fear could be interpreted as a threat. Minho understood this when he was advised to avoid heights after his presentation.

“I'm going to the bookstore. Or maybe the park. I don't know, I don't want to go home too soon,” Minho reassured him.

Jisung stopped in front of his company’s revolving door, his fingers clenched on the hem of his coat.

“Call me if you feel strange, okay?”

Minho stared at him for a moment. He wanted to tell him that he had been feeling strange for several weeks and that sometimes he didn't really know what was instinctive or not about his behavior. But Jisung's gaze, and what he saw in it, prompted him to simply nod his head.

“I promise!”

“Okay, fine. I...” Jisung vaguely pointed to the door behind him as he shifted from one foot to the other. “See you tonight, Minho,” he whispered.

Then he disappeared inside the building.

To Minho, the rest of the day seemed to unfold in a thick fog, obscuring his thoughts and vision.

He wandered around downtown with no real purpose. He didn't seem to see what was inside the shop windows. All he could see was a rigid, mechanical silhouette. Several minutes passed before Minho realized that the silhouette following him was nothing more than his own reflection. 

Walking along the edge of the park, Minho saw children playing under the watchful eyes of their parents, who were ready to rush to their aid at the slightest fall or bump. A poster near the park entrance caught his eye. Half torn off and stuck on the bulletin board between two ads for babysitting services, it displayed in large red letters that it came from the Alpha Behavior Regulation Citizen Service.

A furtive glance. Cold sweat. (S)he avoids patrols. What if it's an Alpha in rut?
Protect your loved ones, report any perceived behavioral anomalies!

Minho looked away.

Maybe it would be better to just go somewhere else after all.

Arriving in front of the small neighborhood bookstore, Minho slowly approached the window display featuring the week's new releases and bestsellers. Maybe a book would catch his eye enough to go inside.

His gaze was immediately drawn to the book prominently displayed with a red and gold sign proudly reading: “Worldwide best seller!”

But he was horrified when he realized what it was.

The title instantly made him feel nauseous.

Monitored, controlled, marked, civilized: The modern Alpha.

The words echoed inside him. Condescending.

He stood frozen, his heart in his mouth, unable to look away. The image on the cover depicted a man wearing a collar strikingly similar to the one around his own neck, his face contorted with rage.

“I've read it twice and honestly, it's an eye-opener about who they are!” a voice announced behind him.

Minho didn't even try to see who had spoken. He abruptly looked away and walked away from the bookstore, his hands clammy and his stomach churning violently.

He tried to walk calmly so that it wouldn’t look like he was running away.

Minho didn't feel like pretending anymore.

He didn't want to shop, socialize, or read more intrusive posters. He was accustomed to all this propaganda disguised as social progress. But today, it felt like being hit in the face with a heavy weight—much more brutal.

Maybe because he was tired.

Maybe because tomorrow everything was going to change for Jisung.

There was only one place where he still felt a little free, a little human. At home. With Jisung, it was even more so.

So Minho headed home, walking stiffly with his fists deep in the pockets of his hoodie, his heart still beating too fast for this world.

The house was silent when he arrived, bathed in the grayish light that was typical of autumn afternoons. He closed the door behind him with a long sigh, then stood motionless in the hallway for a few seconds, his eyes fixed on the single stair leading to the living room. It was as if his mind was still outside, trying to catch up with him.

Mechanically, Minho took off his shoes, then his hoodie, to throw it on the coat rack without even taking the time to do it properly. He wasn't used to being messy, but his actions always reflected his state of mind. 

It was a disaster.

He crossed the room and opened the window above the sink for a moment, not caring about the icy air that entered the house. It was as if the cold outside couldn't compete with the frozen feeling in his chest as he tried to breathe.

After wandering through every room in a futile search for distraction, Minho finally collapsed onto the sofa, his head thrown back against the backrest and his eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling. The necklace around his neck felt different against his skin, as if it had been relentlessly tightening since that morning.

Bringing his hand to his throat, the coldness of the steel beneath his fingers, the words from the book in the bookstore window kept running through his head.

He closed his eyes.

Monitored. Controlled.

The words stung as if burned behind his eyelids.

Marked. Civilized.

Minho let out a shaky breath before inhaling more deeply, trying to calm his mind and avoid triggering the alarm system. After a few breaths, the scent of Jisung—subtle as it was—reached him. 

He searched for the source of the scent and finally found it on one of his pillows. It was the one Jisung had hugged all night the last time he slept there. Though almost absent, his scent nevertheless lingered clearly, as if permeated in the fabric.

Or as if Minho could fill in the gaps in his memory.

The sweet, powdery scent, recognizable among all others.

An anchor, a shelter thrown into the middle of a hurricane.

Minho gently turned his head and delicately rested his cheek against the fabric. Lulled by the scent he knew by heart, he let himself drift into gentler thoughts—ones he wasn't yet ready to face head-on—until sleep overtook him.

When he woke up, the sky outside the window was already tinged with orange twilight. His heart was beating too fast, and a bitter taste was on his tongue; it took him a few moments to remember the events of the day.

A slight noise caught his attention and finished waking him up. The muffled click of the front door slowly closing.

No broken door or shrill alarm.

Just a familiar, albeit discreet, presence.

Minho sat up immediately, running a hand through his tousled hair and over his face, as if to erase all traces of his vulnerability. However, his still-squinted eyes and the pillow creases that still bore the shape of his cheek betrayed the exhaustion he felt.

Throwing his coat over a chair, Jisung appeared in the doorway of the living room, arms dangling and a tired pout on his face that turned into an indecipherable expression when his eyes finally met Minho's.

There he was, Jisung. Simple, yet intense in his own way.

His presence alone was enough to warm heart and soul without him having to make the slightest effort.

Minho got up and walked around the coffee table without a word, barely brushing past Jisung on his way to the kitchen.

‘Come,’ said his silent invitation.

Jisung understood and followed him.

In the dim light of the kitchen, their movements were almost mechanical. Almost like a ritual.

Water poured into the pot. Infusers filled with dried leaves and flowers. Mugs grabbed from the cupboard without a second thought.

Their routine, a comfort to Minho.

Leaning against the kitchen counter, his eyes fixed on Jisung, who was watching the water for the tea simmering on the stove, Minho felt his heart lighten a little.

“Would you like some honey with that?” asked the younger one, standing on his tiptoe to grab two mugs from the shelf. “It would be good for your throat,” he added distractedly.

Of course, Jisung had noticed his sore throat. Minho wondered why he still tried to hide the little things from him. Just as Minho noticed the slightest changes in his best friend, Jisung was no slouch either.

“No, thanks,” Minho whispered.

He hated the tremor that threatened to be heard in his voice, so he said nothing more. Instead, he simply looked away from his best friend's silhouette and gazed out at the street through the kitchen window. 

The streetlights flickered on a few times, illuminating the dark street with their orange glow as the sun was about to disappear over the horizon. 

“Tomorrow it will all be over,” Jisung whispered, placing their steaming mugs on the counter before sitting down across from Minho.

“Hm,” was all Minho could manage to say.

Minho pulled the mug decorated with the black cat design closer to him. Without ever looking at Jisung, his gaze left the outside world and focused on the amber liquid warming his hands, absentmindedly tracing the rim of the mug with his finger. A slow, nervous gesture.

The silence stretched out, comfortable and yet far too heavy.

“I'm pretending I am not, but really... I'm scared about tomorrow, you know?” Jisung finally whispered.

His voice was so faint that Minho could have pretended not to hear him. But he slowly looked up. Jisung was staring at his tea without actually looking.

“Do you want me to come?” Minho asked, honestly.

“I can't ask you that... I know how hard it's been for you, and I see how you shake every time we walk down that street.”

A shiver ran down Minho's neck. He looked away. Jisung was right.

They stood there for a moment, saying nothing. Until the tea grew cold and the hours passed. Until finally Jisung got up.

“I wanted to come by one last time before tomorrow,” Jisung confessed. “Just... to see you.”

Minho's heart tightened at his best friend's confession. He wished he could wrap Jisung in a big velvet blanket and keep him safe, protected from the world that was too horrible for him.

“You know you can stay here tonight,” Minho whispered desperately.

He didn't look at Jisung as he offered, staring instead at an imaginary point behind his friend, as if to protect himself from his response.

“I– I can't, I have to meet my parents early tomorrow. They want to spend the day with me,” he murmured, looking down at his hands. “And I sleep too well at your place. I wouldn't wake up on time,” he added, blushing slightly.

Minho didn't dare ask what he meant exactly. He just nodded slowly.

A heavy silence settled between them. There was nothing more to say, and yet so many things that had never crossed their lips remained stuck in their throats.

Jisung picked up his coat and took a few steps toward the door. Then he stopped.

“Thank you, Minho. For today, for everything...”

Too afraid to say goodbye, Minho replied in a low voice, “I'll always be here, Jisung.”

Jisung smiled at him, briefly placing his hand on Minho's forearm in a fleeting, restrained exchange. Then, Jisung turned on his heel before Minho could read the doubts in his eyes.

When the door closed behind Jisung, Minho felt a hollow space open up in his chest. A hollow that strangely resembled Jisung's smile before he left.

The silence after the door was closed was even heavier than the rest of the day.

Minho stood there, unsure what to do with his arms or how to breathe. With his whole body. Silence was nothing new to him; he knew how to deal with it. But tonight, it stuck to him like molasses.

Dragging his feet through the house, Minho sat on the edge of his bed. His fingers automatically brushed against the necklace around his neck. As if he had only just remembered that Jisung was gone.

For once, the steel felt warm against his fingers, almost like an extension of himself from being there so long. He didn't feel it when Jisung was around, but it seemed heavier when he was away, and Minho couldn't stop thinking about him. He thought about what he could never tell him. About what he shouldn't desire.

He had always known that he would never be allowed to be normal after they had forced the collar around his throat. The Alpha. The potential danger. One heartbeat a little too strong, anger setting in, and the sirens would start somewhere.

But Jisung...

Jisung was the only place where Minho felt somewhat normal and respected. Tomorrow, however, everything might change. The bond between them, or his own reflection in Jisung's eyes… or worse. Perhaps Jisung would no longer deem him worthy of being part of his life.

Minho fell onto his mattress with a sigh.

The ceiling had nothing to say to him.

He didn't know how he felt about Jisung.

Or rather, he knew exactly how he felt, but had no idea how to express it in a world that rejected any form of tenderness and beautiful feelings in alphas.

Yet it was there. In every glance, every one of their shared silences. In every step they took side by side, never brushing against each other.

Minho didn't sleep that night.

Sleep meant oblivion. And Minho wanted to remember every detail of that crucial day. Jisung's voice, his scent. His gaze before the world decided for him what he should be.

When the first rays of dawn finally appeared over the horizon, Minho closed his eyes and, for once, fell asleep instead of enjoying the quietest hours of the day.

When he finally woke up around noon, the sun wasn't even breaking through the clouds. The sky was gray and heavy, ready to collapse. As he sat up in bed, Minho felt his whole body protest, every muscle tense as a string.

The living room was bathed in a pale, cold light. Nothing moved. Jisung's absence hung in the air, physical, almost painful.

Minho got up and wandered silently around the house. He poured himself a glass of juice and buttered a slice of bread, despite not being thirsty or hungry. He left them on the table untouched. Everything felt wrong, as if he had been thrown into an alternate world while he slept.

He sat down on the end of his couch, simply waiting.

And the afternoon finally came to an end. Heavy. Dark.

Until it was time to leave.

Outside, the atmosphere was heavy on this last day of September. The thick collar around his throat made his body numb with cold, growing colder with each gust of wind that blew against the metal. 

Minho shivered under the gaze of the onlookers staring at him, pulling his cardigan tighter around him and quickening his pace as he made his way towards the Temple of the Mother.

Although it was a place of entertainment on the last day of every month, the temple was only named as such. It was just a large building that sank into the ground like an amphitheatre, with gigantic stone pillars supporting the dome’s vaulted ceiling.

Natural light striking the stained-glass windows of the dome had always bathed the place in thousands of dancing colors, illuminating the large white marble altar on which a solid gold brazier rested. If gods had once been worshipped here, today their dwelling had become the epicentre of presentations.

The Emergences.

Ceremonies in which all the young men and women who had turned twenty-one in the past month were required to come forward in turn and pour their blood into the blazing flames lit just for the occasion.

The atmosphere teemed and bubbled when one entered the depths of the earth. Like the commotion in an anthill, the Chrysalis and their loved ones, as well as anyone else who wished to attend, filled the place, forcing some to stand crowded together at the top of the amphitheatre or sit on the steps carved out of the white stone.

From his position near the temple's large doors, Minho observed the innocence and impatience painted on the faces of the Chrysalis he saw in the front rows for a moment. His heart suddenly tightened as memories flooded back, irrevocably taking his breath away. 

Nearly two years earlier, he had also been in their place, unable to sit still with eagerness to finally become part of the world and discover his true nature. He had stepped forward, proud and confident, when his name was called, to grasp the athame and prick his finger over the golden brazier.

No, Minho definitely couldn't rejoice in their naive impatience. 

And yet here he was, despite having solemnly promised himself never to set foot in an Emergence again, waiting to find out the fate of this brand-new assembly. 

Minho let his gaze wander over the unfamiliar faces, searching for the one person who had motivated his presence there today. His gaze settled on the back of a young man’s neck. Alone and already seated in his place in the front row, the man remained resolutely turned towards the altar despite the commotion around him. 

His whole body moved in slight jerks, imperceptible to anyone not paying attention, but Minho wasn't fooled. He was probably tapping his foot to release the tension he was feeling at that moment.

As if he had felt the gaze on the back of his neck—the burning sensation of being secretly watched—Jisung turned around, his gaze falling directly on Minho's. His eyes widened in surprise, before a smile spread across his pink, cracked lips, which he had bitten too hard.

‘You came,’ he mouthed silently, and Minho smiled back. 

The trembling of his legs stopped immediately, as if Minho's mere presence meant everything to him. Minho felt a twinge in his chest.

‘For you, of course.’

Minho was always there for him.

After all, he had spent countless days by his side, opening his door over and over again in the middle of the night to find him standing there with his bag on his back and his pillow under his arm.

‘You didn't have to.’

Minho remembered the tears that had streamed down his round cheeks just the day before, when he had found Jisung waiting for him at the café at dawn. He was doing his best to maintain his stoic appearance, as if he himself didn't feel the salt stinging his skin and burning his retinas.

‘No, but I wanted to,’ Minho confessed, ending their silent exchange.

And it wasn't a lie. Only Jisung could persuade him to go back to the temple.

This time would truly be the last.

Suddenly, the buzz of conversation quickly dissipated, giving way to a silence filled only with everyone's breathing and footsteps echoing against the stone as they approached. Minho felt a chill seep into his bones.

The procession entered; its members dressed entirely in beige to draw what little light there was onto their silhouettes. They all took their places behind the large altar, facing those who had gathered in the amphitheatre.

They observed the crowd in an almost religious silence, their eyes glancing over each person with enough condescension to remind everyone of their status.

As was customary, Minho bowed his head when the gaze of an omega in the procession met his. A shiver ran down his spine when a few murmurs rose up not far from him in the dense crowd. He quickly realized that he was the only one who had to bow that day.

A familiar shame crept under his skin, insidious and icy.

Minho slowly straightened up, fixing his eyes on the ground or on the chests of those present. He refused to meet any other gazes that would sink him even further into a status he had not chosen.

Then, the roll call began, marking the start of the ceremony. One Chrysalis after another was called up to offer their blood in exchange for the great revelation that would irrevocably change their lives.

The fire burned steadily, without anyone ever feeding the flames dancing in the large golden receptacle. 

“Do Miyeon!”

To the applause of her friends and family, the young woman who had just been called rose to her feet. She walked purposefully toward the brazier, her long auburn hair flowing behind her. 

Minho didn't pay attention to what was happening during the ceremony, but when the young woman gracefully set down the athame that had cut her finger, he couldn't ignore the flames that crackled before turning ink black. 

“Alpha!” chanted the omega mistress of ceremonies to the registrar.

Silence fell like a leaden blanket inside the temple, amplifying the crackling sound coming from the flaming chalice and the trembling of the young woman's breath.

“I–I don't understand... there must be some mistake,” she stammered, without taking her eyes off the flames for a single second.

Of course, deep down, she knew perfectly well that this was not the case. Emergences were not just smoke and mirrors. As far back as human memory could go, they have been an infallible means to reveal the true, still-slumbering nature of every individual. 

A heavy steel collar was forced around her neck by an officer from the control unit, and the metallic click of its tamper-proof lock sounded like a sentence. With his fingertips, Minho couldn't help but brush against the collar encircling his own throat, a painful reminder of his own burning darkness that was still too vivid behind his closed eyelids.

Following this revelation, Do Miyeon's slender body trembled. Her thin, strangled voice begged the members of the procession for another chance, her fingers clinging tightly to the cold stone of the altar. The elders merely returned her plea with unempathetic stares as the officer dragged her forcefully out of the temple. Her cries turned into wild growls on the other side of the officials' doors.

Her new status had just been revealed, and Minho was all too familiar with the nature of the events awaiting the new alpha. She would be listed in the official predator registries of each district, along with dental impressions and endless appointments with the alpha supervisors responsible for monitoring individuals who are dangerous to civil peace. 

The process was always the same for all new alphas.

Minho knew this relentless mechanism well. For he had lived through it, his surveillance collar a scar from those moments.

He didn't even need to close his eyes to picture Do Miyeon, prostrate in the corner of a sterile, padded room, observed and questioned by the authorities during her initial assessment.

Minho felt his jaw clench. Every moment spent here was torture—a reminder—and yet he stayed for Jisung.

He looked away from the doors that had just closed on the new alpha and focused on the mistress of ceremonies, who looked back down at her list. “Han Jisung!” she called. In the deathly silence that still reigned, Minho almost felt as if the name had been shouted, so powerful was the echo.

As if he had been burned, Jisung stood up abruptly, the wooden panel of his folding seat slamming shut violently. Minho's heart was beating so fast in his chest that it threatened to escape.

Jisung walked forward with a somewhat awkward gait; his legs threatened to give way beneath him, so weak were they with apprehension. Minho wanted to stand by his side and hold his hand to show his support. But the introductions were the moment when everyone had to face their destiny completely alone.

The athame struck the brazier, making it vibrate powerfully like a gong, when Jisung grabbed it with a trembling hand. Minho wondered for a moment how Jisung managed to keep the blade between his fingers as he once again failed to prick the pad of his index finger with its tip.

His shoulders rolled beneath his shirt as he took a breath to regain his composure. His posture became more determined, more resigned too—Minho recognized the despondency that seemed to hunch his back—and instead of the usual simple scratch, Jisung pressed the silver blade into the palm of his hand.

Cutting into his tender flesh, the blade began to glow burgundy, and Minho held his breath as a trickle of blood finally flowed from Jisung's palm right into the chalice.

It was the longest moment Minho had ever experienced while waiting anxiously for the answer. His head spun so violently that he almost fainted when he saw the flames rise higher than usual.

They burned with a furious midnight-blue intertwined with turquoise and silver, resembling a polar night adorned with its auroras. They were the most beautiful flames he had ever seen.

“Omega!” confirmed the mistress of ceremonies, and Jisung's entire body instantly relaxed under the eruptions of joy and applause from the crowd.

Minho, however, remained frozen.

He vaguely heard cries of celebration and laughter coming from the crowd. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw young people still waiting for their turn to stand up and clap.

But Minho did not applaud.

His hands trembled as the fear finally left him, and his legs trembled with emotion.

Jisung.

An Omega.

A blessing from the Mother.

Minho brought a hand to his mouth, realizing only then that he had been holding his breath since Jisung's blood had touched the flames. His eyes burned. Not with sadness or joy, but with such strong relief that it was almost painful. 

No steel encircling his graceful neck.

No controls.

No looks of disgust.

Jisung, near the brazier, had not yet moved. His eyes were wide with incredulity as he stared at the blue flames, as if he did not understand what had just happened.

Paradoxically, Minho felt the corners of his lips curl, and something break inside his chest at the same moment. Something that had been repressed for far too long.

Jisung would not be like him.

He would be free and would never carry that weight around his neck.

The cheers slowly died down, the scribe already scribbling Jisung's name in the lineage register as an officiant approached to tie a golden ribbon around Jisung’s wrist. The privilege granted to new omegas to enter the sanctuary after the ceremony.

Still standing at the back of the temple, Minho watched as the mistress of ceremonies leaned over to whisper in Jisung's ear. Jisung's euphoric expression turned serious, and he nodded repeatedly as he listened intently to the instructions.

When Minho emerged from his thoughts, Jisung was already rushing toward him. Everyone’s adoring gaze followed him as if he had been touched by grace.

Jisung already shone with an aura that no one would dare profane.

Without a word, without even a glance at the crowd, Jisung wrapped his arms around Minho's waist, hugging him so tightly that Minho's breath was taken away.

Minho respectfully wrapped his arms around him.

“I have to stay a little longer,” Jisung whispered into his ear. “Apparently for hormone tests and paperwork or something like that… It's stupid, but it's protocol.”

Minho took a deep breath in Jisung's hair, then nodded silently, still unable to form a single word. He knew it was inevitable.

No one except the omegas themselves knew exactly what happened at the sanctuary. Except that the omegas came out with a mark that earned them everyone's respect.

Jisung slowly backed away, his hands still on Minho's waist. He stared at Minho for a moment, as if trying to read something in his eyes.

“Go home. I'll meet you after curfew, as soon as I'm done here.”

Minho's lips stretched into a slight smile, and he nodded without ever looking away from Jisung's tender gaze.

Before parting, Jisung took off the silk scarf he wore around his neck and placed it on Minho's shoulders, partially covering his collar. His fingers gently brushed against the metal, but he said nothing.

“See you at your place, Min. It's over now, you're not alone anymore.”

Then he turned away. Minho stared after Jisung until he disappeared into the crowd. 

Now that Jisung’s true nature had been revealed, nothing compelled Minho to remain at the ceremony. Not even the names that were still called to face the flames.

The cool wind swept across Minho’s face when he finally left the temple, and the crushing feeling that had stayed with him until now flew away with it. The scarf Jisung had lent him was still warm, preventing him from shivering at the icy touch of his collar.

Minho watched jealously as the betas and the families of the few newly presented omegas happily rushed toward the city center, no doubt to fill the bars and restaurants that had been organizing celebrations for several days. Minho stood there, filled with bitterness, until they disappeared into the distance.

No one celebrated the Emergence of alphas.

Being an alpha was the worst thing that could happen to you.

Minho didn't flinch when he felt someone approach behind him; he simply turned around, just in time to see the hand that was about to pat his arm for his attention.

The pain etched on the face of the woman standing in front of him made her look older than she presumably was, and her short auburn curls gave Minho an idea of who she might be. Seeing no omega marks on her body, he refrained from greeting her.

“You are Do Miyeon's mother,” he said more as a statement than a question. The woman nodded softly.

“You are... like her, too, aren't you? Please, how can we help her?”

Like her. It was such a shameful term that she couldn't bring herself to use it. Minho felt nauseous.

“Find her someone trustworthy, for marking or adoption. She needs someone to vouch for her before her first rut sets in, otherwise...” Minho's voice trailed off, unable to finish his thought.

“Otherwise what?”

“You don't want to know,” he replied bluntly before turning on his heel.

He had almost reached the corner of the next street when the woman, still prostrate on her spot, called out to him in a loud voice.

“Do you have someone?” she asked, a tremor of hope in her voice, when Minho turned his gaze toward her.

He could only give her an awkward smile. “Not yet,” he said over his shoulder before continuing on his way, this time for good.

Not yet. 

But Minho considered himself lucky. For two years, he had slipped through the cracks, avoiding the fate that awaited all mature alphas without a title of belonging. Two years that his body had given him a reprieve, an almost normal life.

“I hope you find someone!”

Minho didn't bother to answer her, but the stranger’s kindness warmed his heavy heart a little on his way home. Sympathy from non-alphas toward alphas was so rare that Minho knew he would treasure the stranger's words in his mind for days to come.

He moved slowly through the city, delaying the moment when he would be forced to face the silence of his home for as long as possible. He wrapped the scarf Jisung had given him a little more tightly around his neck, as if to protect himself from his loneliness.

He walked along the stone walls of the park on his way home. Minho, who usually had to go around the park, was able to cut through it to shorten his journey. The park was empty at this hour, probably because everyone was downtown celebrating a cousin’s or neighbor’s good news.

The usual laughter and shouts of children had been replaced by the sound of subway trains rumbling on the other side of the park. The sound caused the water in the large fountain to ripple. It had been turned off by this time, accentuating the silence that enveloped Minho.

He sat there, on the edge of the large basin, too afraid to look for his reflection in the distorted water. Finally, the subway moved away, allowing the liquid to return to its mirror-like state.

Minho wanted to stay there, halfway between the Temple and his home. To freeze time just before sunset.

But he couldn't pause life and time. 

With all his strength, as if to reject the turmoil within him, Minho threw a stone he found at his feet into the fountain, breaking its immaculate surface. And as ripples spread in concentric circles across the surface, reflecting his turmoil, Minho was already reaching the park exit.

With his hands buried in the pockets of his hoodie, he didn't look back. He only slowed down when he saw figures standing at the intersection a little further ahead.

The uniforms of the Alpha Repression Unit patrol members were unmistakable, made of beige with red details and black stitching. There were two officers, just a few blocks from his home. The woman was searching two individuals while the man was simply checking the validity of their identity documents. The yellow passport covers in the officer's hands clearly indicated the individuals’ beta status.

Of course, they wouldn’t dare lay a hand on an omega, whose marks served as a pass during body searches. Minho, however, knew that they would leave the simple betas alone when they saw him. An alpha, alone, at this late hour... 

It smacked of trouble, according to the training they had received.

“Hey you, Alpha!” the officer called out, pushing a beta aside. Minho sighed. “Come here,” he added, waving his hand as if calling a dog to heel.

The soles of Minho’s shoes scraped against the asphalt sidewalk as he approached obediently. He had developed the bad habit of dragging his feet wherever he went. Not only did it give him a sluggish gait and make him appear more harmless to everyone, but it also had always made his life easier during random checks.

"Good evening, Captain," Minho said, greeting him.

The officer seemed embarrassed for a moment. Of course he was; Minho had just called him by a rank that was way too high for him. He wasn't that ignorant, no, he knew the difference between two and three-stripe badges. Still, it always paid to boost the militia's pride.

“Lieutenant,” the man corrected before clearing his throat. “Routine check. We would like to see your papers and, since your status authorizes us, proceed to a regulatory search,” he added in a much kinder tone.

Minho shrugged in assent as he handed over his documents. Technically, he had the right to refuse the inspection, but his desire to spend the night at the station over something so trivial was nonexistent. Better not to draw the Repression Unit’s ire, he thought as the woman quickly checked that he wasn’t hiding any weapons under his clothes.

“I see you don’t have a guardian?” the other officer asked. 

“That’s right,” Minho replied, adjusting the scarf around his neck after the routine pat-down. 

“What are you doing outside at this hour?”

He restrained himself from rolling his eyes. Curfew wasn’t for several more minutes, and the sun hadn’t yet dipped below the horizon.

“I was heading home. I live in the neighborhood just behind the clinic,” Minho simply replied, but the suspicious look the officers gave him made him more than uncomfortable. 

“You won’t object to us escorting you, then?” the woman spoke for the first time, and the disdain dripping from her voice offered no hint of empathy toward alphas. 

Minho had to face the truth: this was far more of an order than a polite request.

He merely shrugged again, inviting them to follow.

The short walk to his home passed in silence, forcing Minho to quicken his pace so as not to appear to dawdle in front of the officers. The steady clatter of their leather boots on the asphalt stripped him of the desire to marvel at the glowing red sky that preceded the darkest hours.

The militia followed him up the few steps to his small house’s porch. Both officers stood stoically behind him as he dug into his pocket for the keys to unlock the front door.

All alphas were required to have a mechanical lock on their homes for security reasons. But really, they were only so the militia could lock them up inside in case of necessity, Minho thought, forcing the key into the brass lock and struggling to turn the bolt.

Suddenly, the door of the neighboring house swung open, catching Minho’s attention for a moment, to his neighbor. She stepped onto her porch and glared at them with disdain.

“What has he done?” she demanded of the officer greeting her, clutching her wool cardigan tightly across her chest.

Minho quickly understood that, drawn by the noise and movement outside, she had abandoned whatever she was doing to pry for news. Her white hair, wound around velcro curlers, was pinned under a net, and she was still wearing silicone anti-wrinkle patches under her eyes. Seeing him glance her way, she shot Minho a hateful look, causing him to quickly avert his gaze.

He wasn’t offended. It had been a long time since he’d held it against her—after all, she’d always had him in her sights since the day he moved into the neighborhood.

“Nothing at all, ma’am. We’re just escorting him home before curfew,” the man reassured as Minho’s door finally opened. 

“Ah!” she spat sarcastically. “I knew we’d be asking for trouble by letting an alpha move into the neighborhood– they’re nothing but headaches, honestly!”

No longer wanting to hear it, tired of the fate reserved for his kind, Minho silently dismissed the officers before closing the door behind him and tossing his jacket and scarf onto the entryway table.

A weary sigh escaped his lips, and a dull pain began to throb above his temple as he slid down the door until he was sitting on the floor.

Minho didn’t even bother to switch on the light, afraid that it would make the pain worse. He forced himself to breathe slowly, but the tension in his neck refused to ease. He felt wound too tightly, as if his whole body had just shrunk by a few inches.

It was probably just the backlash. The temple hall was crammed full with joyful exclamations. Or maybe it was Do Miyeon’s inhuman scream, the officers or the prying neighbor. It was enough to unsettle anyone.

But the strange, twisting sensation in his stomach was unfamiliar, insidious and diffuse.

Rising slowly, Minho shook his head to rid himself of the dull unease. His steps carried him into the living room, where he drew the curtains to block out the streetlights before collapsing onto his couch.

Lying there, eyes closed, Minho thought back on the ceremony more calmly and on the revelation that was now going to change everything in his life. And in Jisung’s, of course.

He knew Jisung wouldn’t return right away. Revealed omegas had to spend hours at the sanctuary after the Emergence. But he also knew that, in that private moment, omegas received the official mark of their status.

Minho tried not to think about the mark, yet he couldn’t stop wondering where it would be. Visible at all times, obviously. Would it adorn Jisung’s delicate throat, his cheek or his jawline?

Without a doubt, Minho knew it would match its bearer: delicate and beautiful.

But it would forever display his status to anyone who cared to look, and at that thought, something powerful and painful burned deep inside Minho.

He jumped up abruptly, striding across the living room to seize the silk scarf that still carried Jisung’s faint scent. He pressed the fabric to his nose, hoping it would calm down the frantic pounding of his heart.

It wasn’t enough. For now, though, Minho would have to make do with that. Just enough to slow the intrusive thoughts of others looking at Jisung with the same spark in their eyes that lived in his own.

He stood there for a while, eyes closed, the fabric pressed to his face slipping through trembling fingers, undone by a turmoil he couldn’t name.

Minho inhaled again, more deeply, as if trying to anchor himself to the moment. Then slowly, he turned away.

Fatigue weighed on him, heavy and insidious, more mental than physical. In the half-darkness, he returned to his couch. He lay on his side, legs curled to his chest just as he had done when he was little.

He pressed the silk to his cheek, close enough to breathe in its soft fragrance and the smoothness of the fabric. He closed his eyes.

And in the silence, cradled by the scent of his best friend and the gentle embrace of longing, Minho waited.

Somewhere between apprehension and fascination, he drifted off to sleep, his mind filling with images of forests and peaceful scenes of everyday life.

In the haze of his slumber, Jisung suddenly appeared. He was there, right before him, bathed in a soft golden light that caressed his silky skin.

Jisung’s bare feet slid across the wooden floor as he advanced slowly towards Minho, a glimmer in his eyes that Minho had never imagined seeing there. It was as if he were surrendering to him.

The shirt he wore was slightly unbuttoned, revealing his collarbones—and the mark that made him an omega.

Pale, interlacing lines stretched across his throat and curled upwards towards his jaw like wisps of smoke.

Minho reached out a hand for a moment, then let it fall against his thigh. There was nothing rational about his desire to trace the mark with his fingers; it was purely animalistic. The desire to possess it, as if the imprint had been carved into that burning skin for him alone.

Jisung moved closer slowly, as if he belonged in the house. He knelt before Minho and took his hand. He was near, too near, and yet still so far away. Minho could feel Jisung’s ragged breath against his lips.

He sensed an unfamiliar fragrance intensifying, sweet and all-encompassing, flooding his body and thoughts like a drug. He wanted to pull away, but found himself unable to move, helpless but to give in.

Jisung brought Minho’s hand to the mark on his neck, and Minho could feel Jisung’s heart pounding wildly beneath his fingertips. Their eyes met and locked together. Minho didn’t know what Jisung saw in his eyes, but suddenly the younger one stood up.

Minho was about to beg him to stay and tell him he had misunderstood whatever he thought he had read in his gaze and in the depths of his soul. But Jisung didn’t move away. Instead, he settled on his lap, cupping Minho’s face with his hands.

Then Jisung kissed him, wrenching a plaintive moan from him.

Their lips found each other with fervor, driven by the visceral need they shared. Minho’s breath was stolen.

Jisung kissed as if he had the power to mend the world. As if he had been waiting for this moment as intensely as Minho had.

Never would Minho have imagined sharing a moment like this with Jisung. His fingers clutched at the hips within reach, holding the omega against him as though letting him go would shatter him into a thousand pieces.

The heat radiating from Jisung felt unreal as he whispered Minho’s name against his lips.

Timidly, Jisung’s tongue brushed against his, and it was as if Minho were breathing for the first time. He couldn’t think anymore. There was nothing but Jisung’s body in his hands and his breath mingling with his own.

Jisung’s hand slid along Minho’s torso, rising to graze the skin beneath his collar with reverence and almost devotion. A muffled whimper died in Minho’s throat as desire seeped into his veins. Breaking the kiss, breathless, Minho buried his face in Jisung’s neck.

“Ah– Alpha!”

Desire became animalistic when it touched the soul, instinctive and ferocious. His grip tightened on Jisung’s tender skin, the tension spreading to his jaw, even his gums. His teeth grazed Jisung’s golden flesh at the nape of his neck, ready to pierce the tender skin.

Then suddenly, the world reeled in flickering light.

Minho opened his eyes to the ceiling of his living room. Air whistled into his lungs as he fought to steady his erratic heartbeat.

He didn’t have time to savor the illusion. It burst like a soap bubble.

A metallic crash shattered the tense silence, followed by the dull crack of the lock and hinges giving way to a battering ram. The front door crashed to the ground in a cacophony of shattered glass. Harsh white light flooded the room as authoritative orders were shouted.

“Immediate intervention! The alpha is entering pre-rut!”

Two soldiers from the special intervention unit stormed into the apartment. Startled, Minho could only manage to get to his feet, legs trembling and mind still mired in his dream.

“No, wait!” he stammered, still breathless.

But no one wanted to listen.

One of the agents struck the back of his knees violently, forcing him to collapse. The other was already approaching, a black muzzle in hand. Regulatory, reinforced straps, and a metallic mouthpiece to force the tongue out of reach of the teeth.

“Don’t touch me!” Minho screamed, panicking as he struggled.

His breathing quickened, instinct in full revolt. Driven by a primal will, he tried to push away the agent pinning him to his knees. But it was useless—the man was trained, and not alone.

“No! Please, Jisung will be back, I’m waiting for him… he– he’ll think I left, that I abandoned him without a word.”

His voice broke painfully as he continued to fight. But the two agents slammed him against the nearest wall. His face was wrenched aside, and the muzzle was strapped on him. The metallic taste of the restraint, forcing his tongue beyond his teeth’s reach, made him gag immediately.

In pain, humiliated, everything blurred before Minho’s eyes. All that remained in him was a visceral dread: what if Jisung came back only to find him gone?

What if everything they had barely brushed with their fingertips, everything they could have become, died here, now—with a muzzle and the law?

A whimper escaped him, weak and muffled by the muzzle, as the agents tried to drag him away. His nails clawed at the living room floor in a desperate attempt to cling to it. For Jisung.

His heart pounded furiously in his chest, and Minho felt his teeth press helplessly against the metal gagging him and forcing his tongue down, as his wrists were strapped behind his back. The agents seized him roughly despite his incomprehensible growls, lifting him by the arms so his feet no longer touched the ground.

Minho screamed, but the steel in his mouth silenced him.

Jisung. Jisung. Jisung.

No one could tell that he was calling out to him.

He was dragged onto the porch by force. The red and white flashes of the militia vehicles burned his eyes. Neighbors had gathered at their windows and behind security cordons. Hateful stares, horrified whispers. Minho couldn’t distinguish any of them; his vision blurred by the shame he felt. The only thing he could see was the black van with tinted windows waiting at the bottom of his steps.

Minho was forced to his knees at the back of the van while agents stationed there swung open its armored doors. The light rain soaking through his pants chilled his legs to the bone.

His gaze swept the street, desperately searching, and finally landed on what he had hoped for. Jisung had just appeared at the corner, brown hair damp and mussed from running. He stopped dead in his tracks, frozen by the scene unfolding before him. The matte black van, the flashing lights, Minho on his knees in pajamas, the muzzle and restraints making him docile. Humiliated.

Minho’s eyes met Jisung’s frightened gaze as an agent yanked him upright. Minho thought his heart would implode in his chest, beating so violently.

Jisung staggered a step back, then caught himself. Minho wanted to scream. To call out to him, to explain everything. He wanted to swear he’d waited, that they’d just run out of time.

But the steel locking his jaw in place wouldn’t allow it.

All Minho could do was stare at Jisung with painful intensity as he began to struggle again. His wide, shining eyes begged.

Jisung didn’t move. He stood frozen, panic etched on his face.

It was too late.

One of the agents slammed the van doors shut, and the world went dark as Minho’s hands were strapped to the designated bar inside the vehicle.

Minho felt as if a blade had been driven straight into his heart—the last image of Jisung he would carry was that wounded look in his eyes.

Jisung had seen him like this. Shackled. Muzzled. Like a wild animal, a monster that had to be locked away. No doubt he now thought Minho was like every other alpha: dangerous and unstable. Perhaps he would never know that Minho had fought, only to wait for him…

Inside the van, the air was heavy with a mixture of metal, sweat, and burnt smells. Minho was only just catching his breath.

They hadn’t given him time to put on shoes; his heels, scraped from being dragged, struck the cold steel floor with each jolt of the vehicle.

Minho was cold, the thin fabric of his shirt was soaked. He hurt too, his wrists wrenched back by regulation straps. The muzzle pressed against his jaw, preventing him from opening his mouth wide.

The officers didn’t speak to him, but they chatted among themselves. As if he weren’t there, they played cards under the buzzing neon courtesy light.

“Seriously, I don’t get why they still let them move into civilian neighborhoods. This one could’ve caused real damage,” one said, slamming down his card.

“He’s crazy! Did you see his eyes when we grabbed him?” another added.

They laughed.

Minho clenched his fists, unable to suppress a growl. The sound reverberated through the cabin, louder than the engine. He wanted to scream, bite, rip off the muzzle and spit in their faces.

But he wasn’t the animal they saw in him. He wouldn’t give them that show.

“What a noisy bastard!” one officer remarked, rolling his eyes before pulling out an electric choker.

Minho saw the electric arc, heard the threatening crackle just before the officer pushed the device onto his thigh.

The searing, sharp pain rooted itself in his flesh and spread throughout his entire body. He arched his back violently, his skull slamming against the van wall as tremors tore him apart.

It was as if his chest had caught fire, cutting off his breath. He couldn’t scream. His body was wracked by uncontrollable spasms. All Minho could do was twist and writhe like a dry leaf tossed into flames, stripped of all dignity.

His body was no longer his own. Every muscle screamed in agony, taut to the extreme, as the pain flicked his thoughts off like a switch.

“See? They’re not so hard to handle!”

The comment sliced the air, amused, under the laughter of the other officers.

Minho felt his body slacken, collapse entirely, as the taser was withdrawn from his leg. He slid to the side, cheek pressed to the van’s grimy floor. And everything went black.

He surfaced in waves, his body slowly rejecting unconsciousness. Numb, sprawled on the floor, he felt a pounding hammering his temples as he finally opened his eyes. A groan escaped him involuntarily, but was quickly cut off by the taste of metal on his tongue. The muzzle was still in place.

“On your feet, animal!”

A voice snapped suddenly, followed by a brutal kick to his ribs. The reinforced boot of an officer.

Minho inhaled painfully as two pairs of gloved hands hoisted him roughly out of the van. The night air crashed against his face, sharp and almost acidic after being trapped so long in the stifling cabin.

Raw concrete buildings rose all around him into the night, lit by powerful floodlights and looking imposing and unwelcoming. The light burned his eyes after so much darkness.

Two officers flanked him, nearly dragging him forward, his feet scraping the ground again, until they passed through the towering fence bristling with barbed wire that surrounded the complex.

He could barely make out the other figures in the distance—shackled silhouettes being lined up before a row of gates. He was too distracted by the shouted orders and the barking of Malinois dogs.

“Block D, confinement! New intake.”

Minho staggered. The ground slipped beneath him, gravel biting painfully into his bare feet. Each step was an effort, a torment. He grimaced behind the muzzle.

One officer yanked harder on his arm. “Come on, no tantrums! You’ll love your new kennel!”

The others laughed again, joined by the guards watching the perimeter. Minho didn’t react. He clung only to the hope burning inside him: to the thought that Jisung was waiting for him.

In the yawning, cold, sterile entrance of the building, Minho noticed a panel on the wall.

Alpha Detention Center C17, Block D.

Suddenly, a flat, female voice echoed through the facility above the door.

“Subject identity?”

The agents looked at each other dumbly, not having the slightest idea of his identity.

“Uh… Classified Alpha, in pre-rut. No mark.”

A metallic click was heard, then the sliding door opened with an unpleasant hiss. A harsh light swallowed them, burning Minho’s retinas uncomfortably.

The inner hall smelled of bleach and iron. The faded, dirty white walls vibrated with a faint, troubled hum.

The woman who had let them in pointed to a glass cell in the hallway. “Room 3. Decontamination first.”

They shoved him inside without ceremony. The disinfectant made the floor stick to his feet. They removed all his clothes with a cutter, tearing them apart like stubborn packaging, leaving him naked despite the cold. Then they took off the straps binding his arms behind his back and the coercive collar before leaving him alone in the room.

Minho stood tall even as the decontamination nozzles started spraying a freezing mist all over his body. The liquid burned his skin where it was raw, and the sharp smell of antiseptic rose to his throat.

“Turn around. Raise your arms. Spread your legs,” these commands were given one after the other without emotion, as if they were addressing a dog.

Minho obeyed.

Not for them. For Jisung.

When the nozzles stopped spraying him, they threw him a pair of coarse fabric pants—too big, shapeless. And nothing else.

No underwear. No shoes.

They barely gave him time to dry off. Drops of disinfectant were still streaming down his torso when a pair of agents, who were clearly higher-ranked than the capture squad, entered the room.

“Registration procedure: Subject 521D-23. Alpha, unmarked, pre-rut declared.”

Minho blinked. He would no longer be called by his name.

“We’ll begin the examination,” the man who had just identified him continued, grabbing a tablet.

A thermal scanner was run along his body, and the temperatures carefully noted. His glands were palpated and checked one by one: the agent checked behind his ears, at the base of his neck, his wrists and between his thighs.

One of the agents collected a pheromone sample with a specialized tube that he inserted into a portable machine.

“Secretion above average. High risk of violent reaction in the future,” he confirmed, turning the screen toward his colleague, who hurriedly recorded the levels.

“We’ll inject a regulator,” replied the man with the tablet before leaving the room.

A few moments later, he returned with a chair and told Minho to sit down. Barely had he settled in when metallic restraints closed around his wrists.

“The subject may experience dizziness and loss of consciousness.”

An injection was made into each gland at the base of his neck; the liquid created an uncomfortable pressure at the injection site. His vision swayed slightly, but nothing more.

While he regained his sight, the agent made him smell several fabrics impregnated with different types of omega pheromones.

Minho didn’t know what kind of reaction they expected from him as the samples went by without nothing much happening. However, by the seventh or eighth sample, he couldn’t stop his body from reacting.

It was sweet and sugary, slightly milky…

Just like Jisung.

Minho clenched his jaw and turned his face away.

“Note the reaction,” the agent said. “Subject is sensitive to soft and delicate profiles,” he announced before unlocking the restraints binding Minho’s wrists with his badge.

He was escorted out of the decontamination room by the other officer, while the first stayed behind to finish writing his initial report.

Silently, Minho was escorted through a maze of gray, drab hallways before being stopped in front of one of the many armored doors he had just passed.

Someone handed him the rest of his uniform: a jacket made of the same fabric as his pants, a plain t-shirt, three pairs of underwear, and a pair of slip-on shoes without laces.

“Cell 14. Lights out in…” the agent glanced at his watch nonchalantly, “forty-two minutes.” He then unlocked the steel door with his keyring and pushed Minho inside.

The door slammed shut with a chilling clamor. Then a deep, calm voice addressed him.

The cell was already occupied.

A musky, vanilla, and peppery scent betrayed the presence of another person in the cramped space. The fragrance that wafted to his nostrils was muted, almost imperceptible, but Minho's condition seemed to amplify his perception.

“Welcome to Room 14 of C17. Hope you won’t miss your bed too much, the bunks here are hard as stone.”

Minho slowly lifted his eyes, his vision still blurred from the disinfectant burning furiously in his eyes.

On the top bunk sat a young man with blond hair. His gaze gleamed in the dim light, and his legs swung in the air over the edge of his bunk.

An alpha. Just like him.

“I’m Felix!” he introduced himself, leaping gracefully from his perch, and the vanilla smell followed him suit. “Come on, I’ll take off that nasty muzzle for you. Then you can tell me your name.”

When the blond man reached out his hand, Minho took a step back. He couldn’t bring himself to trust this stranger. Not right away, anyway.

Felix immediately raised both hands in a calming gesture, palms forward. “Easy, mate. I don’t bite… unless that’s your thing, of course.”

A slightly insolent smile spread across his lips. Minho found it strange. This guy seemed far too at ease in such an inhuman place.

“You want my help or not?” added the blond more softly. “Otherwise, you’ll have to keep it on until breakfast.”

Minho studied the blond carefully. He looked much slighter than him, but you could never really judge an alpha’s strength by their build. Felix didn’t seem violent either, with his big sparkling eyes and radiant smile.

Minho hesitated for a few more seconds, but then took a first awkward step into the cell. His wrists burned where the straps had bitten into his flesh, and his jaw ached from the constant pressure of the steel.

He didn’t want to endure that until morning.

Felix approached cautiously, making sure not to move too suddenly and frighten him further. He examined the straps and metal fastenings with an expert eye.

“Keep your head straight. I’ll get this off in no time!”

The blond man returned to his bunk, slipped his hand under the thin mattress, and rummaged around blindly. He returned to Minho with a slim manicure kit.

Even when Felix came close to his face with what looked like a needle and tweezers, Minho didn’t move. The subtle clicking near his ear and jaw made him hold his breath to make the task easier for his cellmate.

A few seconds later, the leather harness loosened, and the steel opened with a click.

The muzzle fell to the floor with a metallic clatter, and Minho drew in a sharp breath.

The icy air rushed into his lungs, and he was seized by an uncontrollable fit of coughing. Dry and violent, shaking his whole body.

Felix stepped back and hopped onto his bunk to give him space, trying to reassure him. “There you go. That’s better, breathe. It’s the chlorine in the disinfectant burning your throat. You’ll get used to it.”

Minho brought a trembling hand to his sore jaw and massaged it, trying to ease the stiffness. His fingers brushed the welts etched into the skin where steel and leather had bitten into his flesh mercilessly. He then raised his eyes toward the blond, who was swinging his legs cheerfully.

“... Minho.”

Felix nodded, his smile widening further. “Nice to meet you, Minho. You just got caught, huh?”

Minho tensed slightly, wondering how the other could have guessed.

“I can smell it!” the blond continued, as if reading his thoughts. “Fear, anger, and a leftover humiliation not yet digested. Don’t worry, we’ve all been through it.”

Remaining silent, Minho stood awkwardly, his back against the wall and his few belongings in his hands.

“Here, they test, they monitor, they isolate. And sometimes they break.” Felix leaned toward him to observe more closely. “You, they haven’t tried that yet, I can tell. You’re still standing!”

Minho lowered his eyes.

Unable to imagine what the alphas might endure here if his transfer was considered an easy ride. The place was not prone to distractions. It was cold and closed off, without even a tiny window to look outside and gauge the time or imagine being elsewhere.

More softly, Felix added, “But it comes quickly. Especially if you’ve got no one outside. If you do have someone, though… think of them. Maybe you’ll stay whole.”

Silence fell.

Minho sat on his assigned bunk, which creaked under his weight. He placed his belongings under his pillow before putting on his shirt.

Felix lay back down as well, his arms behind his head. “Get some rest. Here, sleep is the only reprieve you’ll get.”

And for the first time in a long while, since the night before his own Emergence, Minho closed his eyes without any certainty of what tomorrow would bring.

But he wasn’t alone.

That was something, at least.

Morning came without a single ray of sunlight piercing the cell. The gray ceiling was the same shade as always. Only the harsh, artificial light of the ceiling spotlight turned on with a sharp click, blinding and inescapable.

Minho emerged slowly from sleep. His body was still heavy and sore from the electric shock of the day before. He opened his eyes, his back stiff after sleeping on that wafer-thin mattress as hard as a wooden board, and the coarse sheets sticking to his damp skin.

Above him, a familiar voice sounded.

“You’re finally waking up? I thought you were dead.”

Minho turned his head.

Crouched at the edge of the top bunk, Felix was leaning toward him, his blond hair sticking up on his head from gravity, his eyes strangely alert for this early hour.

“Feels like I slept like a rock,” Minho murmured hoarsely.

Felix grimaced. “They really drained you, huh?”

Minho didn’t answer.

Instead, he slowly pushed himself upright and sat on the edge of his bunk.

He wrinkled his nose.

The cell reeked of disinfectant and the combined scents of the alphas released during the night.

He sighed.

His bare, scraped feet finally touched the freezing concrete floor.

He shivered.

“They deliberately keep the temperature super low,” muttered Felix, who hadn’t missed a thing, “supposedly to reduce the risk of us snapping.”

“And does it work?” Minho asked.

The blond rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right!”

He jumped down from his bunk and walked over to the small stainless-steel sink in their cell, letting a thin stream of water run.

“They say it calms urges and inhibits pheromone production,” he said. “But really, all it does is freeze our hearts. And our balls, too, for that matter,” he added before splashing his face roughly.

Felix shook himself like a wet cat, then dried his cheeks on a towel hanging from a silicone hook. He glanced at Minho, still sitting on the edge of his bunk.

“Come on, get up! If you get to breakfast after the others, you’ll only get leftovers.” 

No sooner had the blond finished speaking than the armored door of their cell cracked open with an unpleasant creak.

Reluctantly, Minho stood up; his back and thighs still aching and his stomach knotted.

He wasn’t hungry.

But part of him knew he had to eat something if he wanted to survive here.

Agents were stationed at regular intervals along the hallway. Motionless but watching closely for the slightest suspicious sign among the alphas.

Felix went through the door first, head down, Minho on his heels as they walked the corridor leading to the cafeteria.

Against all odds, a wave of muggy heat greeted them as they pushed through the double swinging doors. The air was thick with sweat and barely restrained pheromones. Minho stifled a gag.

The cafeteria had a high ceiling, its impersonal walls lined with long metal tables bolted to the floor with heavy security screws.

About thirty alphas, all wearing the same uniform, were already seated there.

Felix walked up to the distribution counter without sparing a glance at those already eating. He grabbed the plastic tray handed to him, not forgetting to say thank you. Minho was next. Staring at the cereal bar, industrial applesauce, and a piece of bread on his tray, he thanked the server and joined Felix, who was waving him over to the end of an empty table.

Minho slowly sat down, his stomach tightening with anticipation. The meal wasn’t much, but by all means, he was glad to get any food at all.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a group of three alphas at a neighboring table—much bigger than them—staring at them. He could sense the hostility in the air, as well as the general exhaustion. No one fought here. Not without losing something precious, anyway.

Felix began eating without a word. He chewed slowly and strangely, almost mechanically, with great concentration. And Minho forced himself to copy him, eating in small bites.

He discreetly observed the others. The empty stares, the precise movements, the silence…

Felix paused to murmur, “Avoid the groups. Don’t talk to the guys near the cameras. And if someone provokes you, lower your eyes and let it go.”

Minho nodded almost imperceptibly.

He was about to reply when an agent entered the cafeteria with a clipboard in hand. “Morning assignments!” she announced, flipping a page to find the list of detainees. “516D to 520D, garden duty.”

Shouts of joy broke out among the chosen ones.

“521D-23,” Minho recoiled at the sound of his number. “Doctor Jang wants to see you. The rest of you are on chores duty…”

Felix lifted his head, instantly becoming more alert and looking almost worried as his eyes locked on Minho. He set his fork down noiselessly and placed his hand on Minho’s wrist.

Minho, for his part, felt his stomach twist subtly. Not from the nearly expired applesauce, but from the mention of the doctor.

Around them, no one paid attention. The agent had already continued the roll call, their monotonous routine resuming. Minho, though, heard nothing but the dull thudding in his ears.

Felix leaned gently toward him. “Don’t look him in the eye and only answer when he asks you something. No details, no hesitation. He loves breaking defective parts.”

Minho didn’t reply.

A guard approached them and nodded at Minho. “Get up. Let’s go!”

He cast one last glance at Felix before finally standing up and following the guard escorting him.

The walk was silent until they reached a wing that reeked of medicinal alcohol and metal instruments. Endless corridors branched off and crossed every few yards, forming a hellish maze. Minho wondered for a moment if this was perhaps a way to prevent escapes from the medical wing. Then the guard stopped him in front of a door with no sign on it.

Behind it was Doctor Jang’s examination room, as welcoming as a freezer. The man was already waiting, seated behind a metal desk bolted to the floor, his long grayish hair tied in a catogan.

Behind his tortoiseshell glasses, his piercing gaze never left Minho as he gestured for him to sit. Minho couldn't see any omega marks on the doctor’s skin, nor could he detect any particular scent. The doctor must surely be a beta.

“521D-23,” the doctor consulted his tablet while rubbing his temple. “Recent transfer and regulator injection upon arrival. You’re not under a voluntary inhibitor, are you?”

Minho shook his head, eyes fixed firmly on the table.

Without another word, Jang stood to put on gloves and circled Minho like a vulture around a carcass.

He grabbed Minho’s chin between his fingers to examine his eyes. A small light stick was passed in front of his pupils to check their dilation.

The doctor set the lamp back on the desk. “Open,” he then ordered, pressing Minho’s lower lip down with his thumb.

Minho obeyed, jaw tight, gaze locked straight ahead.

The doctor's gloved fingers entered his mouth slowly and deliberately, cold and clinical. They traced his gums and teeth to assess their strength. When he reached the canines, he pressed sharply on the nerve in the upper gum, forcing Minho's fangs out manually.

A thin trickle of saliva immediately escaped from the corner of his lips as he groaned in discomfort.

The doctor didn't care. He remained like that, his fingers anchored in Minho’s mouth, observing his exposed canines with icy calm. Minho forced himself to breathe through his nose; his cheeks red with anger and humiliation.

“What lovely canines,” Jang whispered with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. “I hope I won't have to file them down one day. But some people forget their place here, and then it becomes necessary.” 

Minho tensed involuntarily, feeling a painful tension in his jaw as he resisted the urge to bite down. The doctor's fingers moved slightly, pressing against his tongue with slow, inquisitive deliberation.

He was fully aware that Minho hated every second of it.

And he seemed delighted.

Another trickle of saliva ran down Minho's chin. He clenched his fists but didn't move.

“You're already producing a good amount of pheromones. Can you feel it?” the doctor whispered in his ear like a secret. “I give you no more than three weeks without inhibitors.”

With his jaws aching, Minho didn't answer. He was nothing more than a test subject, a specimen. Jang had just taken it upon himself to remind him of that fact.

When the doctor’s fingers finally withdrew, Minho looked down. After removing his gloves, the doctor wiped his hands with a disinfectant wipe as if he had just touched something dirty.

Then he returned to his desk, where he immediately began writing his observations in Minho's file.

“You may go. A guard is waiting outside.”

Without even glancing at him, he moved on to another file.

Minho staggered slightly as he left the office, his mouth dry and a dull pain behind his temples. The humiliation still clung to his skin like sticky sweat that wouldn't dry.

A guard pushed him roughly into the hallway, escorting him silently to the residential wing.

He found Felix in front of their cell, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. “He kept you in there a long time,” the blond said simply, without even looking at him.

Minho didn't even bother to reply. He just walked past him, opened the door to his cell, and collapsed onto his bunk without saying a word.

He didn't feel like talking. He just wanted the burning and discomfort in his gums to stop, the images to fade from his memory.

Felix didn't ask him any questions, as if he sensed his cellmate's distress. He hurried back to his daily chores, leaving him alone to process and stomach the doctor's visit.

Minho stayed in his cell for the rest of the day since he hadn't been assigned any particular task. Time passed in a blur, and Minho was surprised when he saw Felix finally return from a day of labor.

That evening, they didn't talk. The neon lights went out, and the corridors sank into darkness. And the center resumed its cold, steady, suffocating rhythm.

The days stretched out. Monotonous and similar in every way, but never identical. 

In C17, time had a completely different relativity. It did not flow; it stagnated, thick and viscous. The hours passed at the same pace as a drop of pitch, time spent there decelerated and felt like Minho had lived there for years already.

Wake up at six o'clock. Check vital signs. Pills distributed to those with a prescription. Cold shower. Breakfast. Chores. Forced rest.

Minho had never been so closely monitored. Any movement, any rise in blood pressure or temperature triggered a note, a report, an alarm. He had learned to walk even more slowly, to speak more softly, to contain his pheromones as much as possible.

There were a multitude of other cells like his, other alphas whom he often saw only from a distance—some strangely calm, others completely consumed by madness, broken. 

The groups were never mixed for more than half an hour a day. They were always supervised and separated by unit the rest of the time.

Yet, Felix seemed to navigate the system with disconcerting ease. He knew the rhythms, everyone's habits, which guards they could talk to, and the words to say to defuse any conflict.

So Minho began to follow him everywhere he could.

Felix shared everything he could with him. From his strategies for feigning docility, the names of caregivers and agents to avoid, to the dishes to decline in the cafeteria. Apparently, desserts without lids were highly suspicious.

He taught Minho how to suppress his pheromones for his interviews with Dr. Jang, and also how to identify the guards in the hallway by the sound of their footsteps.

Each new day brought new unspoken rules. Felix called his insights and tips the Survival Manual for Hostile Environments.

And when evening came, behind the closed door of their cell, Felix regained a form of humanity he didn’t show outside.

Minho saw him return to his lively, funny, smiling young-man persona. Felix told him about his dreams: the café-bakery by the sea and the little house next to it that would be his.

While Minho remained silent.

Until one particular evening when they were both lying in their respective bunks.

“Hyung... are you sleeping?” the blond whispered after Minho turned toward the wall.

Minho hesitated to answer for a few seconds. But if Felix felt vulnerable enough to call him hyung, he definitely couldn't ignore him.

“No. What's going on?”

“I'm being transferred,” the words came out bluntly, raw and violent.

Minho sat up to search for Felix’s face in the darkness. “Transferred where?” 

“I don't know. For all I know, it could be a new center, or to an omega who's willing to pay for an unusual pet.”

Despite the bitterness of his words, not a hint of emotion showed in his voice. 

Minho remained silent for a moment, his eyes lost in the dark void surrounding them. The silence of the night, usually calm and reassuring, was charged with feverish tension that evening.

“You know, I liked to pretend I didn't give a damn about the chores, doctor's visits, and bullying,” Felix continued. “I make jokes just so I don't have to think about him.”

Minho felt his throat tighten. And the blond continued, his voice barely louder than an exhausted whisper.

“I think I've forgotten his voice, Hyung. I only remember his face and his hands. He liked to slip them into the back pockets of my jeans.” A small laugh escaped him, a broken sound. “His name is Jeongin. He's not perfect, but he always looked at me like I was the only person who mattered.”

Minho couldn't help but ask the question that was burning on his lips. “Your omega?”

“Maybe? His Emergence happened a few months after I was brought here,” Felix paused, the silence only punctuated by the brief rustling of his sheets. “Even if he was an alpha, I don’t think it would change anything for me. I just don't want him to live like me.”

A long silence followed, heavy as a leaden blanket, as Felix turned toward the wall. Minho thought it was over, that they would fall asleep with their hearts in pieces. But Minho wanted to show Felix that he understood him more than anything.

“Jisung,” he said hoarsely.

Felix brutally stopped moving and it sounded like he had just sat in his bunk to hear him better. Minho lay back down, unsure if he could bear the weight of his confession any longer.

He stared at an invisible spot on the mattress above him, unable to remain silent now that he had opened the floodgates.

"Jisung is... an omega. I was waiting for him to come back from his Emergence when they took me away from him.“ He took a difficult breath, his fingers clenching the rough fabric of his oversized sleeves. ”He called me hyung, too. But he said it like a promise. I think we could have had it all... but we didn't have time."

A hot tear rolled down his cheek and disappeared into nothingness. The void of darkness and the one of the white-hot pain clawing at his wounded heart.

“He was there when they took me away,” he added in a broken voice. “I saw him in the distance, with his hurt look. I'm afraid I mean nothing to him anymore.”

“Maybe they're waiting for us,” Felix replied in a barely audible voice. “Maybe they remember our promises.”

Minho didn't answer. The silence in the cell had returned, but it was no longer the same. What had once felt so vast and cold now felt like a comforting embrace.

It vibrated with shared memories, with names whispered in the darkness.

The mattress above him creaked for a moment, and then a long, peaceful breath escaped from Felix's lips. A few seconds later, his breathing slowed and became more regular.

He was asleep.

Minho stayed awake for a while longer. His eyes closed, but his heart was wide open. Each beat of it was too loud, too painful. Images of Jisung flashed before his eyes. His smiles, his hands, his warmth.

Then images of Felix in the privacy of their cell appeared. His deep voice, his slightly hoarse laugh. His tenderness, hidden as soon as the door opened...

And somewhere in the midst of this strange mixture of memories and fears that blossomed in the dark, sleep finally overtook him, too.

The next day, the alarm in block C17 went off like a knife stabbing his skull, forcing Minho out of his deep, dreamless sleep.

He opened his eyes with a start, almost disoriented by the neon light already illuminating his cell. It seemed to him that he had fallen asleep barely ten minutes earlier.

Remembering the previous day, his heart skipped a beat. He sat up abruptly.

Felix's bunk was already empty.

Not just empty. The sheets had been pulled taut, the wrinkles smoothed out, and the pillow stacked on top of the neatly folded blanket, just as they would be during inspections.

He hadn't even had the chance to say goodbye.

Staring at the metal bed frame, Minho hoped that Felix would reappear at any moment, jump gracefully out of his bunk, say something stupid about the upcoming breakfast, or tease him when he screamed under the mandatory cold shower.

But nothing happened.

Just silence. And emptiness.

Far too vast for this cramped cell.

Mechanically, he washed his hands and face at the stainless steel sink, then gulped down the ice-cold water that burned his throat. He ignored the weight crushing his chest like a vise.

But in the cafeteria that morning, Minho didn't eat. He let his porridge grow cold on the tray while staring at the bottom of his bowl, jaw clenched, eyes vacant.

One of the agents stood near his table, reading aloud a list of news and incidents. Minho wasn't really listening, but one word struck him like an arrow.

“Convoy attacked last night. No survivors among the staff and alpha on the run. If you have any information that could help locate him...” the officer looked meaningfully at Minho, who had just raised his head. “Please pass it on to us as a matter of urgency.”

Minho was shaking, his heart beating so hard that he struggled to hear the rest of the announcement.

Felix.

He hadn't arrived at a new center. Nor was he in the hands of an omega collector. 

He had escaped. Or someone had pulled him out of there.

But that was enough. 

Even though Minho couldn't be sure, it was enough to spark something burning and insidious in his chest.

Hope. Relief at knowing his friend was free.

But the days that followed were like sinking. A slow, silent but insurmountable slide.

Minho kept getting up. Kept breathing.

But something inside him had died.

With Felix gone, he had no one and nothing to hold on to in the cold, concrete world. No one to reassure him after his humiliating and tense visits to Dr. Jang.

He did his best not to think about it. He kept his eyes down at all times—as there was no one to look at—and did his chores and tended the vegetable garden in silence. 

Minho barely ate. And he slept even less.

His body and senses were constantly on alert, on edge. The slightest scent reminiscent of an omega made him falter. During the tests, a remnant clinging to an agent's clothes, a new shampoo... just that was enough to twist his insides.

And every night, without exception, in his empty cell, he thought of Jisung.

Nothing could distract his mind from what he missed most. His soft skin, the roundness of his cheeks. His laughter...

His pre-rut was back. And this despite the dozens of injections, each more painful than the last, administered by the doctor since Felix had left. Neither the inhibitors nor the cold environment could make the fever that had overtaken him subside. 

He had held on. Three days. Four. Then on the fifth, he woke up in the middle of the night covered in sweat. The rough cotton sheets stuck to his bare skin, and an unbearable burning sensation in his lower abdomen.

He had writhed in pain until morning, his entire body shaking with spasms, his teeth clenched into one of his arms to keep from moaning.

On the sixth day, he felt insistent stares on him as he entered the cafeteria. He struggled to walk, his muscles aching so badly, and one of the big alphas from block C19 sneered at him. The alpha flashed a predatory grin in Minho's direction. It was loaded with innuendo and latent mockery.

Minho sensed it even before he fully understood it: his pheromones were escaping the tenuous control he had managed to maintain over them until that moment.

Of course, the alpha had sensed it. Everyone here had sensed it.

A signal. A scent.

Lowering his eyes, Minho slowly turned to leave the dining hall. His heart pounded, his skin burning where it touched his uniform.

With his hands ready to push open the swinging doors, he heard an alpha whisper,

“Look at him... he can't help being in rut despite the treatment. No one will ever want him.”

Minho froze in place.

The next second, he had already turned around and covered the distance between them.

A tray flew through the air, crashing to the floor with a loud bang. The agents screamed. Minho jumped at the throat of the nearest alpha, fangs bared and face contorted with rage and pain.

“Stop him! He's gone crazy!”

He didn't even know what he was doing anymore. All he could recognize was the taste of iron between his lips, blood, the softness and tenderness of the flesh beneath his teeth and the strength in his jaws.

“Damn, he bit a chunk out of him!”

All he could feel was the fire raging inside him. His body, his mind, his calm—all gone.

Brutal, uncontrollable, explosive. His rut had just hit.

For a remark. A whisper.

Reinforcements arrived almost immediately. Electric shocks struck him in the midst of his crisis. Breathless, he fell to the ground, his limbs shaking with spasms.

He heard the screams, the hurried footsteps of the inmates being evacuated to their quarters, the crackling of the officers' radios.

A distant voice echoed. “Isolation. Block K.”

Silently, they lifted him up by his armpits and dragged him through the corridors; his body still trembled from the electric shocks. 

His fangs refused to retract, and his breathing was ragged and wheezy. This time, however, he remained conscious, the rut buzzing with frenzied energy inside him.

Each step the agents took echoed off the cold walls. The neon lights buzzed and flickered intermittently above them.

An armored door opened with a metallic creak at the end of the hallway. The icy air of the cell took his breath away as he was pushed roughly inside.

The reinforced door slammed behind him with a thud that vibrated through the air in the narrow room.

No bunk. No window. Just four gray walls—one with a huge, one-way mirror—a spotlight on the ceiling, a camera in each corner, and the distant hum of the ventilation system.

Two agents were still standing behind him, and Minho tried to fight, but one of them slammed him against the wall with a sharp jerk, holding him by the neck. Minho’s shoulders hit the cold surface, eliciting a hoarse growl.

“On your knees!”

He was forced to obey. The rough concrete dug into his knees, and his wrists were pulled sharply backward, clamped into reinforced handcuffs with chains that wound into reels buried deep into concrete wall.

One guard grabbed Minho's hair in his gloved fist to lift his face, while the other seized a leather and steel device.

“Open!”

Minho turned his head as far as the hand in his hair would allow, in refusal. But another gloved hand grabbed his jaw and forced it open.

The metal scraped against his lips before being forced between his teeth. The bitter taste of metal filled his mouth as the curved plate of the muzzle pressed against his tongue.

The device attached to the grate forced his jaws open, designed so that his fangs and teeth would never come into contact or bite his tongue once the muzzle was secured.

The straps were tightened behind his head, pressing painfully against his cheeks. A trickle of saliva escaped him, sliding between his pursed lips and falling onto his chin.

Throwing his head back, Minho closed his eyes and struggled for breath, humiliated by his inability to swallow.

Without another word, the guards tipped him back so that he was sitting against the wall. His arms hung at face level because of the chains holding his wrists.

Long chains attached to the floor were then secured around his ankles, the cuffs clanking as they were closed.

His shirt was roughly cut off and confiscated, his shoes were also removed. Then the heavy footsteps of the guards receded and the metallic clang of the door sealed his captivity.

Alone.

Tied.

Gagged.

The harsh light remained on, relentlessly casting his motionless shadow on one wall of the room. 

Minho was now nothing more than a display body. Diminished and left to slowly waste away. Less than a man—a wild and dangerous animal.

The heat in his veins now pulsed with haunting regularity.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

With each beat of his heart, a burning wave traveled to his temples. His rut did not diminish, quite the contrary. Confinement sharpened it, exacerbated it, now that he had nothing to distract him.

He tried to move, but the sharp clank of the chains reminded him that he was no longer free. His tense shoulders were starting to burn in this position.

And Minho realized that he had to tire his legs if he wanted to relieve his arms, and vice versa. What sounded like a resigned sigh escaped through the gaps in the bars.

He lowered his head, the cold metal of the grate touching his bare chest. The mouthpiece crushed his tongue, causing a dull pain mingling with shame as strands of saliva continued to escape from his lips. 

A muffled growl rose in his throat, threatening and uncontrollable.

The room seemed to shrink around him.

The tension in his trapped jaws increased under the pressure of the muzzle. Saliva accumulated in waves, falling inexorably onto his chest, tracing a wet path.

Minho was cold.

A dry, cutting cold that seeped into his already painfully tense muscles. His wrists were already tingling with an unpleasant numbness, the steel of the handcuffs leaving an icy bite on his bare skin. He fought the urge to stand up already to relieve the tension in his arms.

Exposed to the freezing air of the cell without his shirt, Minho shivered. And this despite the dull heat awakening in his stomach. The latter was anything but gentle. It was a vicious fire, slowly creeping up his spine and lodging itself at the base of his skull.

It came like the feeling of a storm brewing long before it hit. A change in the air, an electric tension that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. The gland at the base of his neck was already congested, releasing his pheromones haphazardly. A growl escaped him when he realized that his other glands would soon follow suit.

That's when he smelled it.

A heavy, almost sticky scent, as if the air had suddenly thickened around him. A smell he didn't know, yet seemed to belong to him, as if it came from within and spread despite himself.

Chocolate, warm and saturated with something more bitter. Salt and a hint of burnt cardamom that stung his throat. And behind it all, the bitter flavor of cocoa beans.

He inhaled despite himself, and the smell hit him like a slap in the face. His muscles tensed, making the chains rattle against their rings. The suffocating scent made its way between his lips, depositing the taste of his pheromones directly on his tongue. 

The cell was saturated with him.

He had never smelled anything like this before. Never. Alphas did not carry a distinctive scent until they reached this point... and now that Minho had, he understood why mature pheromones were described as impossible to ignore.

Each breath was a closed loop, a vicious circle. Minho exhaled his own scent and inhaled it again, denser, heavier still. It clung to his nostrils, his throat, clouding his thoughts. And the more he smelled it, the more the burn in his stomach rumbled, growing almost painful, gaining more and more ground.

Minho suddenly stiffened, shaken by a violent shiver that ran down his spine. His fingers clenched, clinging to the chain, his nails scraping against it. But the restraints gave him no respite. A low, animalistic groan rose in his chest but was strangled by the muzzle. The sound made him shudder with shame.

He was nothing more than a body stretched to the limit, every fiber of his being seeking contact, friction, release.

The smell intensified.

Minho knew. His glands, excited to the point of hysteria, were flooding the confined air with his signature scent. To attract a partner.

But no one would come. They wanted him to burn, to exhaust himself. 

And the pain of his excessive desire collided with the haunting image of Jisung that his mind tried to conjure up. Something in Minho cracked.

His entire body stiffened, and the chains on his wrists stretched to their limit as he arched his back as far as possible. His breathing became erratic as he struggled in vain to free himself from his bonds. With each breath he took, the pungent, saturated smell returned to his system, and he could not escape it.

He gasped.

His eyes closed and saliva foaming at the corners of his forced-open lips.

At the mercy of whatever had been unleashed within him.

A constant hum filled the cell, not quite a sound, more of a vibration. Dull. Perhaps it was only coming from inside his skull, rattling his eardrums.

His wrists throbbed where the metal had cut into his flesh, leaving it red and swollen. His tongue pressed desperately against the steel plate, which didn't budge an inch, and his saliva flowed incessantly, thick and warm, down his chin.

He felt hot and cold at the same time. The burning inside met the icy moisture that settled on his skin. The heat of lust seeped lower, a fiery weight in the pit of his stomach, an ever-growing tension. Like an invisible hand squeezing his insides.

Minho had stopped thinking clearly. Images came unbidden: an exposed neck, hands clinging to his hips, an “Alpha-” moaned with desire... then, suddenly, Jisung's face appeared.

The memory had the unbearable clarity of a dream you can't escape. Jisung's eyes, bright, almost feverish with desire. His pink, shiny lips.

Minho moaned. A feverish shiver ran through him, his temples throbbing to the frantic beat of his heart. His head rolled forward, unable to stay upright, his tousled hair sticking to his damp forehead. A thin film of sweat covered his shivering body.

His cock was standing proud, pressing against the fabric of his uniform pants, throbbing with unbearable heat.

Minho tried to curl up, to relieve this painful erection which begged to be touched—to satisfy Omega—but his bonds prevented him.

The animalistic scent of rut was everywhere now, wrapped around his chocolate pheromones, saturating the air, imprinted in his lungs. It spread through him like poison, numbing all resistance.

Minho rocked gently back and forth, instinctively, searching for a rhythm or anything to ease the tension. The chains creaked with each oscillation.

The world faded away. All that remained were the painful light on the ceiling, the metal against his skin and on his tongue, and the unbearable burning in his body. 

Everything else drifted away like fog dissipating in the wind.

The presence of the guards and caregivers, whom he knew were watching him from behind the mirrored glass, was unbearable. But there was nothing he could do to hide from their gaze; he was exposed, and they showed him no slightest shred of humanity. There, Minho lost track of time. All that remained were the clanking of his chains, the saturated air, and the fever growing within him. Each minute stretched out like an hour, and each hour seemed as long as a day.

When it seemed evening had arrived, a faint noise came through the ventilation ducts. Then, a foreign scent mingled with his own—soft and slightly sweet. A dull rage rose in his chest, and he pulled on his chains so hard that the metal vibrated from the tension.

The scent was not that of an omega. It had no warmth, no logic, no life. Just a hollow, synthetic fragrance. Typical of the laboratory pheromones used to neutralize the aggression of alphas in crisis.

He growled without even trying to hold it back.

A low, threatening sound vibrated against the metal plate of his muzzle and into his bones.

His body tensed to the extreme, straining against the metal cuffs on his wrists as if he wanted to tear them off, and his muzzle creaked under the pressure of his jaws.

In the hours that followed, Minho became unpredictable. At times, he remained motionless, trembling with fatigue and with his eyes lost in the void. At others, he threw himself against his bonds without warning. His knees struck the floor, his shoulders the wall, as his breathing turned into muffled roars. 

His wrists were swollen, streaked with marks that were already turning purple. Saliva had dried on his chest and chin, only to return, a humiliating reminder of his glaring lack of control.

His rut and rage did not subside. 

On the contrary.

Despite the numerous synthetic pheromones bombarding his cell, the animal scent of his own pheromones had become heavier within the walls. Suffocating, rancid with rage that each new chemical attempt had gradually reinforced.

After a while, footsteps echoed in the hallway. The door opened to reveal a man in a white coat flanked by two agents.

Minho looked up, his trembling, dilated pupils searching for those of the man’s.

“Dr. Jang, nothing has had any effect on him. We don't know what to do anymore,” one of the agents complained.

The man in the white coat nodded without saying a word and pushed his glasses up his nose with a sharp gesture.

Minho stared at him. He didn't know why anymore, but that face seemed familiar. A distant impression, blurred by the fever of rut; a name on the tip of his tongue, yet impossible to pronounce.

Jang crouched down to his level. And at that moment, Minho could no longer think clearly. His whole body lunged forward, driven by pure instinct. His chains clanked as they pulled him back brutally, twisting his wrists until the skin tore. A powerful growl rose in his chest, vibrating through his ribs. His fingers stretched out, hooked, aiming for the man's throat. 

He wanted to grab him, pin him to the ground, crush him beneath his weight. He wanted to twist his neck and bite him until he was disfigured.

The doctor let out a laugh as he stood up, the kind of laugh you give a dog that bares its teeth behind a fence. His eyes remained fixed on Minho's without even blinking once. “We'll get the file tool ready for when you get out of here.” It was an open provocation.

“Negative reaction to sedatives and aggressive behavior toward staff,” he noted to one of the agents in a more clinical tone. Then, his gaze slowly drifted down to Minho's bruised wrists, the spasmodic tension in each of his muscles, the sweat beading on his bare skin. “Dangerous alpha: unfit for release, unfit for adoption,” he declared, his voice neutral as if he were discussing a routine case.

Minho screamed—or at least tried to; the sound broke against the muzzle—and struggled again, muscles bulging with effort, trying to tear the men who stood within sight but out of reach to shreds.

There were no words left in his head. Only images remained: bite, lacerate, subdue, hurt. His jaw clenched beneath the metal; he pulled again, his wrists leaving red, wet trails where his skin had broken.

The agents took a step back, but Jang remained motionless. Minho gasped for breath, continuing to struggle and ignoring the pain, obeying only the urges roaring in his blood and lungs.

Minho could no longer see through his blurred vision, but the sound of boots pounding on the rough concrete receded. Then the slam of the reinforced door left him alone with his fury.

He continued to struggle, as if the chains might miraculously give way, each movement generating a searing pain in his wrists. Nothing could calm him now; the pain was drowned out by a wave of violent adrenaline as he pulled and arched with all his might. 

The reels holding the chains creaked ominously under the strain. But they did not break.

Several times, Minho’s head hit the wall behind him with a thud that echoed in and out of him, bouncing off the cramped walls. 

So hard that the plate against his tongue broke clean off and flew to the other end of the cell, leaving a metallic taste on Minho's tongue that was very different from the previous one.

Sometimes he would stop moving for a few moments—his muscles still shaking with uncontrollable spasms—before starting again with renewed fury.

The air was thick around him. Heavy, saturated with his pheromones in every corner, relentlessly reinforced by his incessant panting.

The caregivers tried diffusing a light mist of synthetic calming pheromones. Cold, chemical. Minho didn't react to them. Or rather, he did. Each new breath made him even more aggressive.

It was like trying to extinguish a fire with oil.

When he let himself fall, his forehead pressed against the icy wall, he was nothing more than a shivering heap, his mind at war with his own body. His senses were heightened to the extreme, his body consumed by an urgent, painful desire that he could not satisfy.

His fists pounded the wall on either side of his face as a wounded groan escaped his lips.

Now, with nothing to muffle them, the sounds he made echoed around the cell. Shameful.

The day stretched on like this. Time lost all meaning. The hours, the minutes, everything merged into an endless cycle of rage, exhaustion, and pain. His wrists were bleeding in places, bitten by the steel, and his thighs trembled from struggling relentlessly.

By nightfall, Minho was still conscious, but mired in a kind of delirious fog. 

Imperceptibly, his body continued to tense with rage when he heard footsteps in the hallway, but he no longer had the strength to fight as vehemently as he had throughout the day. He no longer cared who the footsteps belonged to, nor about the people who surely watched him closely through the mirror or the video surveillance.

He finally collapsed, his forehead once again pressed against the wall in an attempt to calm his fever, the chains on his wrists stretched to their limit. His half-closed eyes glowed in the harsh light; he wasn't asleep. Rather, he was dozing off, in a restless, half-sleep where his twisted, unbearable lust gave him no respite.

Minho spent the rest of the night like this: locked in that cell saturated with heady and sickening pheromones, chained, broken and unable to admit it. Unfit. He continued to burn, a prisoner of a body that now betrayed his desire, his craving, without ever stopping.

Desire trembled between his thighs and in his stomach to the same rhythm as his erratic heartbeat in his ears.

Despite himself, his mind drifted into a delirious fog where numerous images overlapped, incoherent. An outstretched hand, a half-open mouth. Bright eyes, exposed skin. Then, the walls, the metal, the clinking of chains. Everything was blurring in his mind.

Sometimes he thought he heard his name whispered in his ear.

Minho.

But it was only an echo of his memories, a product of his fractured mind.

His bruised arms stretched out again, despite the pain, as if one last effort would be enough to break the steel.

Thought and logic were slowly dissolving, far too quickly. And Minho was now nothing more than a shell driven by impulses he could no longer control, an animal with raw instincts.

He wanted to bite and tear. 

He wanted to possess.

His mind was slipping away from him like sand through his fingers.

A moan escaped his curled lips, a barely human sound, turning into hoarse growls.

All that remained was the fog.

And the fever.

There was no Minho left. Only the beast remained. 

Behind the one-way mirror, Jisung froze.

His breath caught in his throat when his eyes finally fell on the figure chained to the wall on the other side of the window.

The figure was covered in sweat, and his skin was streaked with shades of red. The chains stretched and vibrated with every spasm of the convulsing body.

Yet, amidst this chaos, Jisung recognized a profile, a jawline, a tilt of the head.

“Is that him?” he couldn't help but ask, his voice breaking.

The officer shrugged. “Hell yeah, that's definitely him!” 

A sudden chill ran through Jisung. He was unable to superimpose the memory of his friend—strong, laughing, protective—onto the image his eyes were forcing upon him.

The beast behind the glass.

But it was definitely the same person.

A strangled sound escaped him, too close to a scream.

“Let me in,” he whispered, unable to take his eyes off the glass.

The officer on duty gave him a puzzled look, then crossed his arms over his chest. “Impossible! You can see his condition.”

Jisung finally turned away, his features distorted by the panic he was struggling to contain. “I want to go in... he needs me! Me. He'll recognize me, he'll– I can calm him down.”

His voice trembled and his words were jumbled, but there was no doubt in his eyes.

The officer shook his head, firm in his decision. “You think we haven't heard that one before? You have no idea what's waiting for you in there.”

“Then ask,” Jisung said determinedly. “Ask your superiors. I didn't fight for three weeks just to stay behind that glass.”

A tense silence fell between them. The officer sighed, already weary, but still reached for his earpiece to relay the request.

Jisung didn't move. He clenched his hand against the cold window, as if that could bring him closer to the man chained on the other side. He didn't look away for a single second.

Jaw clenched, the officer pressed against the device in his ear. “This is Post Four. The civilian is requesting access to the cell. He claims he can calm the subject down.”

A muffled breath came through the earpiece, but Jisung couldn’t hear the response. His forehead nearly touched the glass, his eyes fixed on the struggling figure. Each of Minho's movements felt a knife being thrust into Jisung’s stomach.

He couldn't understand how this body, which had once been his shelter, could writhe like this. How Minho could scream like this, his wrists raw from their restraints, and yet still stand?

The officer sighed, crossing his arms again. “We're requesting confirmation,” he said coldly. “It may take some time.”

“No!” Jisung growled, louder than he intended.

He tapped his palm on the glass, involuntarily drawing Minho's attention in his direction. Jisung's gaze shifted away, locking eyes with the man in uniform, ready to either beg or bite. Nothing else mattered to him anymore.

“You don't understand,” he said through clenched teeth. “It's me or no one. If I don’t go now, there will be nothing left of him.”

His words sounded like a desperate order.

And behind the mirror, Minho tilted his head back, his mouth half open in a hoarse gasp behind the metal net of his muzzle.

Jisung moved closer, his face almost pressed against the glass. “Hang on...” he whispered, as if Minho could hear him. “Just a little longer. Hang on for me.”

The officer looked away, embarrassed by this sheer and endless distress, but remained silent.

Time stretched out, suspended and heavy, punctuated only by the clanking of chains and the broken growls of the caged beast.

Finally, a sound crackled in the officer's earpiece. The latter nodded and exchanged a few quick words in a low voice, then turned to Jisung.

“Special permission. You will wear the standard equipment.”

Another agent entered with a metal box, which he opened with a sharp movement. Inside was a heavy, almost full-body suit. Scent inhibitor patches, a reinforced chest plate, an anti-bite visor, and leather gloves. As if they were preparing him to face a wild beast.

Jisung felt the bile rise in his throat at the mere sight of the equipment. “No,” he growled.

“That was not a suggestion,” replied the agent in a harsh voice. “You go in; you wear this. Otherwise, you stay behind the glass.”

Jisung stared at him, eyes wide and breath shaky. “If I put this on... he won't recognize me,” he said, his voice breaking. His fingers clenched on the glass as if his nails could break through it. “You think that's what he needs? Another enemy? Another barrier between us?” He took a step back and shook his head violently. “He just needs me.”

The guard hesitated for a moment. Behind the glass, Minho began trembling like a cornered animal.

“Without equipment, it's suicide,” the guard whispered, almost wearily.

Jisung clenched his fists, locking eyes with the man. “Then let me die for him.”

A heavy silence accompanied his statement. The agent exchanged a glance with his colleague, then sighed in resignation. “If things go wrong, we'll pull you out by force.”

Jisung didn't answer. Instead, he just ripped off the gloves the officer had already put on his hands. His heart was pounding so hard that his chest hurt. His legs were shaking—not from fear, but from a burning desire. The desire to join Minho, to tear off his chains, and prove to him that he wasn't alone.

The heavy reinforced door began to swing open with a metallic rumble. The air, saturated with pheromones, rushed immediately into the hallway. Jisung inhaled the scent—thick, wild, and suffocating—and his body reacted with a violent shiver. It was as if every cell in his body had tensed toward the source of the scent at the same time.

One step, then two. He crossed the threshold, and the door slammed behind him.

The humid air hit him like a wall.

Like an invisible weight thrown on his shoulders, his knees almost gave way on the spot, and his breath caught in his throat. 

Minho's pheromones rushed into him unrestrained, wild, saturated with fever and burning desire, reaching all the way to his lungs.

Jisung had never felt anything so intense.

His heart pounded so hard against his ribs that it made him nauseous. He pressed one of his hands there, against his chest, as if it could contain the erratic rhythm beating beneath his fingertips. With his other hand, Jisung clung to the wall beside him as best he could so as not to collapse.

His entire body reacted to the overwhelming tide emanating from Minho, almost preventing him from thinking.

The slam of the reinforced door behind him made the walls vibrate. Minho suddenly raised his head.

His bloodshot eyes, shining with bottomless madness, searched for the source of the noise—and fell on Jisung.

His whole body tensed in a single movement. The chains immediately stiffened, the metal creaking under the sudden pull. Beneath the steel obscuring his face, Minho's lips curled into a sneer as he let out a hoarse, guttural growl that vibrated deep in Jisung's stomach.

It wasn't a name he uttered. Just the sound of an animal that had just sniffed out its prey.

Jisung remained frozen, breathless and unable to move.

The man in front of him had all the characteristics of his friend, but it wasn't him. That wasn't him anymore. 

That body, those eyes. They belonged to Minho. But they no longer reflected anything familiar. They were the eyes of a beast, every muscle swollen and ready to snap under the tension, every breath fueled by an unquenchable fever.

And yet. Beneath the fear that was making its way through him, beneath the dizziness that was crushing him, Jisung felt something else. It was as if his own body knew. That Minho was calling for him, wanted him, had chosen him in his fever.

His fingers clenched against the wall. “Minho...” he whispered, his voice breaking and barely audible.

The alpha reacted immediately. A sharp blow, a clank of chains, a more intense growl. As if the name had amplified his rage, two syllables that stoked the fire in his skull.

Despite his fear and his legs begging to give way, Jisung took a step forward. The force of the pheromones almost brought him to his knees, his body in tune with the one who was calling him without words.

He had no plan. No certainties. Only the crazy conviction that he had to cross that space, reach out despite the chains, to remind Minho that he was not alone.

With one hesitant step, then another, Jisung approached. His heart was beating so fast that his ears rang from the rush of blood to his eardrums. And yet he continued forward, as if drawn by a force completely beyond his control.

However, the sharp sound of chains stopped him in his tracks.

He looked up. Minho had pulled so hard that his wrists were twisted in an almost impossible way. Every muscle in his body twitched, as if the distance between them were unbearable.

Jisung took a deep breath, and the spice-saturated air burned his throat. He understood immediately that he had reached the limit. The exact point where Minho could try to throw himself at him, to reach out his arms, but where he couldn't reach him. An invisible, terrifying limit.

Jisung stood frozen. Only a few steps away from Minho.

Fear was the first to speak. His whole mind was screaming at him to back away, his instincts telling him that it was madness. But beneath the panic, another sensation vibrated, just as violent, a thrill that had nothing to do with fear. A heat that knotted his stomach, as if Minho's pheromones had triggered something buried deep within him, something he had never known before and things he had never dared to acknowledge.

His eyes sought out the Alpha's. Troubled, delirious, but fixed on him as if nothing else existed.

Jisung swallowed hard, no longer sure what belonged to him, what came from Minho, and what came from his own burgeoning desires. His fingers trembled at this realization, and despite himself, he reached out slightly. Just a little. Just to cross that invisible wall.

But he stopped halfway.

Did he have the right to touch him?

Was it still Minho, or just the beast devouring him with its eyes? What if he only fueled the fever? Would that bring him back?

Jisung felt his breathing quicken and his legs wobble. He had never felt so weak, so lost—and yet unable to back away.

Minho suddenly stiffened, as if he had sensed his hesitation. His eyes widened, a wild spark flashing through them like lightning. His chains clanked violently as he lunged forward, throwing his whole body toward Jisung. His teeth snapped behind the muzzle.

Jisung jumped back, his hand withdrawing in a panicked reflex. Breathless, he thought for a moment that Minho was going to reach him, that their reunion would end like this—in rage and blood.

But the chains held the alpha back mercilessly.

Minho remained suspended there, only a few inches away. Their faces were almost touching, separated only by an invisible chasm. Minho’s hot breath hit Jisung's skin, jerky and animalistic. His gaze was a feverish ocean, shining with violence... and a completely different glint.

Jisung felt his legs buckle beneath him. 

With trembling hands, he leaned against his own thighs to keep from collapsing. With each breath, the pheromones were more powerful than the last, and Jisung reeled, feeling almost drunk. Yet, despite the fear and the heat that was beginning to consume him, Jisung stayed.

“Minho...” his lips parted to utter his friend's name. His voice was weak, almost broken. But it cut through the heavy air like a fragile glimmer of light.

Minho jumped. His nostrils flared, and his gaze fixed on Jisung even more intently. Jisung felt his chest tighten.

He took a deep breath. “Can you hear me? It's me. Jisung.”

The name echoed between them in the saturated space like an anchor thrown into a storm. Minho growled, a guttural sound, but his posture barely changed. Less violent, more hesitant.

Jisung let the words flow, even though his voice trembled. "Minho, I'm here, you see? Look at me,“ his breath shortened. ”You've always been there for me. Now it's my turn. I didn't leave you, Minho. Stay with me."

His voice broke, but his eyes never left Minho's. There, in that fragile in-between where the beast could still tip one way or the other.

Minho growled again, but it wasn't the same sound. Less furious, less raw, it trembled, almost strangled as if something were stuck in his throat. His chains clanked weakly as he took a staggering step back, his pupils still fixed on Jisung.

Jisung, panting, could feel his heart pounding against his ribs. He didn't dare to move, as if he were holding the match that would start a raging fire. His fingers trembled, but he raised them gently, once more, just enough to reach the limit set by the chains.

“Minho, it's me,” he repeated softly.

The alpha's body shuddered. A slight hesitation passed over his features. His lips parted, but only a hoarse sound escaped. Yet, amid the roughness, Jisung heard something other than a growl. A faint echo. As if his name had slipped underneath.

His eyes widened. “Yes, that's right. Jisung. I'm here.”

The pheromones continued to fill the air, making it suffocating. But Jisung clung to them, refusing to flee. His chest rose quickly, too quickly, but the words flowed.

“You're not a beast, not a monster. Not to me. You're… just Minho. My Minho.”

A silence spread between them.

Then slowly, the alpha's wild gaze blurred with something else. As if an invisible struggle was going on behind his eyes, a dull pain. His chest rose with a trembling breath. His tense face leaned imperceptibly toward Jisung's outstretched hand.

He didn't touch it.

And Jisung knew.

He had reached him. Just a little.

The metal clattered again, but this time it was no longer the brutal, violent shock of a beast pulling with all its might. Minho oscillated between the rabid beast and something older, more human, trembling just beneath the surface.

His nostrils flared with every breath of air saturated with the scent of an omega so close, so available... His instincts begged him to reach out and to snatch this omega from the distance separating them, to bite and claim him as his own. But behind the frenzy, another sensation was awakening, taking over, one that was even more painful than the fever consuming his body and mind. 

He knew that scent. 

Not just the omega's scent, nor just the impossible-to-ignore call vibrating through his veins. No. There was a very intimate note buried in that fragrance, and it caused a dull pain in his chest.

“Ji–”

The sound escaped from between his cracked lips, almost drowned out by a growled moan.

Jisung's heart lurched. His knees trembled as the sound torn from this cage vibrated within him. His eyes misted over despite himself, but he held on. His trembling hand remained outstretched, frozen in the fragile space between them.

“Yes, it's me. I'm here.”

Minho took an uncertain step forward; the metal holding him back creaked with an oppressive echo. He leaned forward, his muscles tense like a bow. 

Jisung didn't back away. But his breath caught in his throat when he saw the shadows of doubt, desire, and rage battling in his friend's eyes simultaneously.

Then it happened. A tiny gesture. A brush.

With trembling fingertips, Minho touched Jisung's outstretched palm. It was a simple, fleeting touch, as if his body had acted out of his control, as if he needed to feel that skin against his own to prove to himself that it still existed.

Jisung gently closed his fingers around Minho's, without rushing or forcing.

A hoarse, strangled groan, mixed with what sounded like a sob, escaped Minho's lips.

Jisung bit his lip to keep from faltering, his own body shaken by a violent shiver. Everything in him screamed that he shouldn't have done it, that he was exposing himself, that this contact was dangerous. Yet, he felt that he was letting something slip away.

First came a diffuse warmth, a dull vibration in his stomach that slowly made its way into his veins. Then, the air seemed different, carrying the new scent of a fragrance he recognized as coming from him. Soft, subtle, blending the lightness of floral honey with a timid, almost fragile hint of talc and cotton.

Minho's eyes widened immediately. His tense body froze as if nailed to the spot by this revelation. The rumbling in his chest stopped abruptly, replaced by a trembling silence. His fingers clung more tightly to Jisung.

In the cell, the omega's pheromones spread, subtle, awkward, but powerful nonetheless. They did not seek to dominate or coerce; instead, they gently enveloped Minho. Like a warm blanket on a winter night.

Minho gasped, his body shaking with nervous spasms. The aggression in his movements had dried up, though. His wild eyes quickly softened, blurred with a moist glint. “Jisung...” he whispered, as if that name had brought him back to life.

The latter felt his knees sink into the icy ground. His chest rose and fell rapidly, his cheeks burning with shame at having let himself go so easily.

“I– I'm sorry, I– it just came out,” he whispered, his eyes darting away.

An imperceptible smile stretched across Minho's bruised lips behind his muzzle. “It's okay… n-normal, you–” he didn't finish. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes, and for the first time since his rut had hit, his shoulders relaxed. Just enough for Jisung to notice, with desperate relief, that his pheromones seemed to be taking hold.

The omega's delicate scent lingered, hesitant yet persistent, and Minho breathed more slowly, as if each breath brought him a little closer to the surface. He didn't let go of Jisung's hand, unable to abandon that anchor and source of warmth.

Jisung was still trembling. But a resolution was slowly growing within him. His eyes lingered on Minho's wrists, lacerated by the metal biting into his flesh. Each breath caused waves of pain that he couldn't hide.

Jisung took a deep breath. “Wait, I– I'll help you,” he whispered.

He let go of Minho's hand, not without a twinge of sadness, and stood up to examine the restraints. His fingers brushed against the wall mechanism since he didn't have the power to release the handcuffs. He did so quickly, feeling slightly tense at the thought that Minho might decide to throw himself at him. 

But the alpha just stared at him, panting, his pupils still dilated but fixed on his every move.

The click of the lock echoed faintly as Jisung released the safety catch of the pulleys. The links vibrated as they unwound, giving the chains several inches of slack. Not enough to free Minho, but just enough for him to sit up without his arms being twisted into an unbearable position.

Minho's shoulders slumped slightly, and a hoarse sigh, almost a groan of relief, escaped through the muzzle.

“There,” Jisung whispered, his hands still clinging to the pulleys. “I can't do any more. But... at least it hurts less.”

He dared to look back at Minho. Minho was still staring at him. Raw gratitude flashed through his eyes, as if the gesture had finally broken down the walls of rage and fever that had confined him inside.

His lips moved faintly under the muzzle, forming a word that Jisung almost didn't hear.

Thank you.

That single word made Jisung tremble. Fear turning into something else. Something more dangerous, perhaps. 

His pheromones escaped again, this time more insistent and less discreet, as if his body knew a truth that was still unknown to him.

Minho's breathing immediately became heavier, captivated by this new fragrance filling the air. His nostrils quivered and his eyelids fluttered for a split second under the assault, as if the scent struck beyond even his instincts. His body tensed abruptly, causing the chains to rattle.

Panicked, Jisung took a step back. But the alpha simply tilted his head back, breathing in the fragile scent deeply, as if feeding on it.

A low growl rose in his throat as he looked up at the omega, but it was not threatening. It was almost a pleading moan.

Under the influence of the rich pheromones and that intense gaze that plunged into his own, Jisung felt his whole body weaken. His fingers clenched against his pants, but his legs wouldn't move.

In a sudden flash of lucidity, Jisung wondered if he should stay or run away. Minho could still throw himself at him; he had wanted to just moments ago.

But he hadn't given in.

For that reason, Jisung didn't want to leave. Not when Minho was staring at him like that, with that feverish tension in his eyes—instinct and humanity fighting for every fiber of his being.

An imperceptible movement caught Jisung's eye. Minho's fingers were reaching out toward him, just a few inches, but the intention was clear.

Jisung felt his heart twist in his chest.

He should have backed away, kept his distance as he had been instructed. Instead, his hand reached out in turn, hesitantly, as if some force he didn't understand was pushing him toward the alpha.

His breath caught in his throat when their fingers touched again.

Metal clinked as Minho tightened his fingers around Jisung’s in a fragile contact made desperate by the restraint. The look in his eyes was no longer that of an animal out of control.

It was Minho. His Minho.

Exposed, broken, and feverish. Unable to hide the burning greed vibrating deep within his eyes.

Jisung's heart leapt painfully. “It's you, you hear me, right?” he asked in a trembling voice.

Minho nodded slightly, unable to speak as he gasped for breath.

But Jisung saw, for a split second, a flash of lucidity in the storm of his gaze.

Their intertwined fingers wavered under the alpha's restrained strength. His whole arm trembled, hesitating between squeezing too hard and letting go.

Then, with a sharp tug, Minho pulled. 

Jisung stifled a cry of surprise as he was pulled forward. 

The alpha's face was suddenly very close.

Too close.

For a moment, Jisung's insides froze. In Minho's eyes, he saw nothing but pure, burning, unbearable instinct. His heart began beating so fast that he thought he was going to collapse.

Despite the muzzle, Jisung braced for the bite; he could already imagine the brutal impact of the fangs against his throat.

But nothing came.

Minho, shaken by a violent spasm, abruptly turned his head away. His hot breath met Jisung's skin as he let out a hoarse, torn growl. As if this restraint was hurting him. 

The chains creaked, his muscles tensed to the point of breaking.

And yet he did not move.

He did not give in.

Shaking from head to toe, Jisung remained frozen in place. Slowly, perhaps too slowly, he became aware of the hand that still clasped his. Not to hurt or break him. To hold on.

Breathless, Jisung dared to look up. “Minho... it's me,” he almost pleaded.

Two dark eyes locked onto his. Feverish, but filled with a pain that could only be human.

Jisung felt his pheromones escape again, stronger this time, like a wave stubbornly going against the current. His body betrayed what he dared not say, but he no longer had the strength to fight it.

And rather than sinking back into his fury, Minho shivered under its effect. His fingers tightened even more desperately around Jisung’s.

A muffled but clear sound escaped through the muzzle. “...Sung.”

“I'm here, Minho. I'm here...” Jisung pleaded, his eyes misting over on their own will.

Jisung moved closer, his hands shaking too badly to hide his emotions. His fingers slid gently against the steel biting into the alpha's wrists.

Through his dilated pupils, Jisung could see the struggle. The violence, the fever, the burning desire. But also the fragile recognition that refused to surface fully, coming and going.

The chains still vibrated, punctuated by Minho's ragged breathing. But a veil was torn from his eyes, revealing a spark that Jisung thought was lost.

He hardly blinked, fascinated by the silent struggle playing out before him. His fingers still trembled in Minho's grip, but he didn't dare pull away.

“Sung...”

It wasn't a growl. Weak, strangled by the muzzle, but still terribly human: it was a call.

Jisung's heart tightened. He leaned in closer, ignoring the taste of fear scraping his throat.

Their breaths mingled, violently, feverish. The air, saturated with their pheromones, enclosed them in a bubble where nothing else existed except their tenuous contact and their gazes, which collided without ever letting go.

Minho closed his eyes for a moment, throwing his head back as if searching for the slightest escape from his pain. When he opened them again, his gaze shone with a brutal and heartbreaking resolve.

He leaned forward as far as his restraints would allow, pressing the muzzle against Jisung's shoulder. His voice was nothing more than a whisper torn from his gut. “Mark me.”

The world seemed to stop spinning.

Jisung backed away a few inches, his eyes wide. His lips parted, but no sound came out for a moment.

“What...?” he finally croaked.

Minho's breath crashed against his skin, desperate. His fingers tightened their grip on Jisung's, as if he feared he would disappear.

“I beg you... mark me. Now,” his voice broke. And under the muzzle, Jisung thought he heard a muffled sob.

Everything inside him contracted. His instincts, dormant until now, awoke abruptly and roared at the call. Minho's request made every fiber of his omega vibrate. His body demanded to obey, to yield, to protect and fulfill.

Jisung's breath caught in his throat.

Mark me.

The words echoed in his head like the beating of a drum.

Everything inside him tensed. His skin tingled, and his insides twisted. It felt as if his entire body were pulsing in response to Minho's call.

He wanted Minho. He wanted him so badly it hurt.

But an icy fear made its way through the dizzying heat. His fingers trembled as he clung to Minho's like a lifeline, but his lips parted in protest.

“Minho, I– is it you... asking me this? Or is it just the rut speaking for you?” 

The question hung in the air, almost shameful, but he had to ask. He couldn't give in. Not if Minho didn't know what he was asking.

The alpha's dark eyes locked with his. Despite the fever and pain, Jisung could see a bared sincerity shining through the turmoil.

Minho's lips moved beneath the muzzle, articulating faintly beneath his erratic breath. “I've always wanted you.”

Jisung felt his head spin and his breath catch abruptly in his throat, almost like he would faint. An irrepressible shiver ran through him from head to toe, his pheromones bursting into the air stronger than he ever thought possible.

Breathless, Jisung raised a trembling hand to the alpha's cheek. He would have given anything to feel the softness of his skin against his palm, but he couldn't reach it. The steel and leather of the muzzle prevented him. But his fragile gesture carried all the tenderness he had never dared to admit.

“Minho...”

His fingers slid hesitantly to the burning temple, as if he feared that this simple touch would condemn them both. 

Minho closed his eyes at this derisive contact, a sigh of relief leaving his chest. As if that were enough, at least for a moment.

And Jisung finally understood.

It wasn't just lust. Not just instinct.

It was Minho. Always Minho.

The silence was heavy, broken only by the soft clinking of metal and their almost too-abrupt breathing.

Jisung didn't dare move. His hand remained against Minho's face as their gazes locked onto each other like the only certainty they had left.

“You don't understand...” Jisung whispered, his throat tight. “If I do this... there will be no turning back.”

His words trembled, but his pheromones had never been so determined. They spread even more intensely than ever before, docile and tender, as if his body had made the decision for him.

Leaning forward, Minho tugged at his chains. His shoulders jerked with pain, but he didn't look away.

He shook his head weakly, as if to push away the doubts he saw flashing in Jisung's eyes. His muffled voice passed the barrier of his cracked lips. “I don't care. Jisung... I want it to be with you. Only you.”

Those words hit Jisung in the gut, cutting off his breath in a gasp. His fingers clenched involuntarily in Minho's hair, pulling slightly on the damp, sticky strands.

That was all he ever wanted. He wanted to believe that it wasn't just lust talking. But how could he not doubt, when everything about Minho burned, called and demanded?

Yet the sincerity in his eyes was there, the same he had known hundreds of times before. In their stolen moments, their shared silences, their wordless complicity.

One beat of his heart. Two, then three.

Jisung gave in.

His forehead met Minho's with infinite gentleness, ignoring the bite of the frozen steel against his nose. His breath hitched at the contact, his whole body vibrating with a desire and need he could no longer contain.

“Okay...” he whispered, his words barely audible. “Okay, Minho.”

His pheromones then took on a different tone, frank and ardent, without any restraint. They poured into the cell like a warm, enveloping wave, saturating the air with a scent of abandonment and acceptance.

Minho froze at first, as if he couldn't believe it. Then a shiver shook his chained body, his eyes closed under the force of the emotion, and his captive hands reached out to grab Jisung’s. 

A sound that almost resembled a cry escaped from Minho's throat, and Jisung pressed his hand against Minho's chest, feeling his heart beating like a drum beneath his burning skin.

He wanted to free him from everything: break his chains, tear off that muzzle... But he couldn't. All he could offer was himself. His scent, his warmth, his presence, and the choice he had just made.

“Let me...” Jisung stammered, his lips trembling against the metal separating them. “Let me be yours, and you’ll be mine, too.”

Minho's eyes opened, wet, shining with a devouring intensity. He reassured him almost imperceptibly, a simple nod of his head. But it didn't matter, because Jisung could read everything in his eyes: supplication, gratitude, love, and fear, too.

Jisung moved forward again, finally crossing the barrier that had held him back until now. His lips touched the hollow of Minho's jaw, right where the sensitive skin pulsed against the steel in time with Minho’s racing heartbeat.

And Minho, chained, muzzled, broken, let out a sound that was neither a growl nor a moan, but rather a sigh of relief.

The leather and steel prevented them from kissing as they would have wanted to, needed to, but their breaths managed to intertwine.

Jisung felt like he was suffocating in the heat; his knees threatened to give up beneath him. Yet he remained there, pressing his lips where he could to taste the salt of Minho's skin, his palm still pressed against his agitated chest.

Each beat of Minho's heart, both underneath his hand and against his lips, resonated like a plea.

But Jisung still hesitated.

His instincts screamed. His body cried out to him to cross that final line. Yet, the small voice of doubt stubbornly resisted.

“I... I don't know if I have the right,” Jisung whispered against Minho's throat.

The alpha pulled violently on his restraints, shaking with his own body. The pain elicited a strangled growl from him, but he didn't back down. His incandescent gaze met Jisung's.

“Mark me. I– Jisung... do it, even if you don't love me like that...” his voice broke painfully.

Jisung felt his stomach knot, and his pheromones surged despite himself, heavy and dense, like a soft duvet that enveloped them entirely in its glow.

The effect was immediate: the alpha's tense shoulders relaxed, and his dilated pupils seemed to shine with a feverish glow.

Without ever taking his eyes off Minho, Jisung's trembling fingers moved down his neck, searching for the exact spot. He felt the burning heat of the glands underneath the skin, swollen and throbbing, exposed despite the chains.

Jisung closed his eyes and leaned down to press his lips against the swelling at the junction of Minho's neck and shoulder. Minho let out a moan when Jisung's breath fell against his shoulder.

Kissing the delicate skin beneath his lips again and again, Jisung dug his fingers firmly into Minho's shoulders, anchoring himself to the moment.

Driven by the sounds of contentment and pleasure rolling through Minho's throat and chest, Jisung rubbed his cheek and nose against the skin between kisses, leaving his scent on Minho to help him relax. And when the tingling in his gums finally turned into an unbearable burning sensation, Jisung bit into the exposed neck.

His teeth found the patch of tender flesh where all the desire and pain were concentrated. His fangs pierced the skin without restraint, claiming his property.

Minho screamed through his muzzle. A muffled cry, yet charged with an almost animalistic intensity—a sound so raw that it made its way to the pit of the omega's belly. His entire body arched and tensed like a bow under the force of the bite, muscles bulging beneath his sweat-soaked skin. The chains clanked together in a metallic echo.

Jisung felt it immediately.

The burning rush. It poured into him like a tidal wave, a torrent sweeping away all thought, every fear, everything that wasn't him and Minho.

His veins filled with a searing heat, and his pheromones exploded. Uncontrollable. Enveloping Minho in a dense wave, saturating the air with a sweet, almost suffocating fragrance.

It was possessive, a violent call. A silent cry that screamed mine.

Against Jisung’s lips, right underneath Minho’s skin, blood pounded hard. Fast. Minho's unique scent, rich and warm, sought to mingle with Jisung’s at all costs, creating an intoxicating alchemy that blurred the boundaries between them.

The alpha gasped violently, his head thrown back, exposing his neck and his features drawn by painful ecstasy. He made no attempt to pull away. Panting, his eyes rolled back for a moment under the violence of the assault, then his body relaxed in Jisung's arms.

The struggle was over.

All that remained was a raw, total, almost sacred surrender.

A growl rose from his chest. A vibrant, almost pleading moan. And his still-restrained arms slowly rose to close around Jisung’s waist, pulling him close with desperate force, as if he feared losing him with the slightest breath.

“Ji...sung...” his broken voice echoed like a confession, a prayer torn from fever.

Pressed against him, Jisung gasped, his lips still pressed against the wound, which he licked delicately to ease the pain. He clung to Minho with all his strength, like he wanted to make a place for himself between his ribs, to become one with the alpha.

But suddenly, an imperceptible movement disturbed their intimate embrace. Minho moved. Not to flee or reject contact, but as if he were trying to see something. To engrave this moment somewhere where nothing and no one could erase it; to verify its truth.

The chains scraped the floor shrilly when he tried to sit up slightly, his hands on Jisung's shoulders, gently pushing him away. The omega let out a plaintive whimper and tightened his arms around the alpha's neck. He didn't want them to separate. Not yet.

“Jisung... Please...” Minho whispered hoarsely from behind the muzzle.

Still nestled in the crook of his neck, Jisung looked up at him, confusion and concern shining in his pupils. “Are you hurt?” he squeaked.

Minho shook his head.

Slowly, painfully, his fingers slid down Jisung's ribs to push him away just enough. To see him properly.

Their faces were only inches apart. The heat between them didn't disappear; it just condensed into that tiny space, vibrating between their breaths.

Minho's eyes searched desperately for Jisung’s. He wanted to anchor him in his memory, burn his image behind his eyelids, make sure it was all real and not some trick of his abominable rut.

Panting, Jisung felt all these intentions through the still feverish bond forming between them. The alpha's dilated pupils seemed to swallow all the light, all reason. Something so tender shone in them that Jisung's heart tightened.

Minho's breathing was ragged when his restrained hand came to rest, trembling, on Jisung's cheek, hesitating between caress and prayer. Then his gaze froze.

His eyes slowly moved up to the omega's forehead, and the shadow of a smile appeared on his bruised lips behind the muzzle.

He had only just noticed it.

The pale, fine mark. Very real, impossible to invent, and so delicate. The discreet seal of who Jisung was. The omega he had always protected, even before knowing what he was, the one he had loved silently for so many years without ever daring to claim him.

With infinite gentleness, his fingers rested on Jisung's face, tracing the pale lines adorning his forehead and temple with almost religious devotion. 

Each of his gestures said: you are mine, you always have been.

“You are so beautiful...” he whispered in a plaintive moan. “Sungie... smells good.”

Jisung's heart exploded in his chest. Hearing his name spoken like that made him dizzy. That simple, gentle touch made the bond between them vibrate in a way he never thought possible.

It was no longer just the effect of their pheromones mingling until they became indistinguishable. It was a new sensation coursing through his flesh, burning in his throat and stomach. A need as vital as breathing, as devastating as love.

Suddenly, everything inside him gave way under the weight of desire, fear and shared tenderness. A single, devastating thought ran through his mind over and over: he wanted to be his.

Not later, not tomorrow. Now. Not in the way he already was his, but in a way he couldn't even explain.

His voice broke as he whispered eagerly. “Minho... mark me.”

The alpha froze immediately.

His eyes widened, distress mingling with his fever in a single storm. A frustrated, guttural sound escaped him. “I'm dying to... but...”

Slowly, he raised his hands, showing the straps and the metal of the muzzle preventing him. 

A strangled groan rose in Jisung's throat as his trembling fingers tried to slip under the leather to tear it off and free the alpha's lips.

But he couldn't.

Minho's distress resonated through the bond like a thunderclap. Jisung felt the echo in his own body, violent and incandescent. 

Their emotions were intertwined. Minho's desire mingled with his own. His pain filtered through the alpha before returning to him, reverberating in every fiber of his being. Frustration, impatience—Jisung no longer knew which belonged to him and which belonged to Minho.

The need became unbearable. Jisung clung to Minho's uniform pants, pulling on them without even realizing it. Eyes filled with tears, stemming from both frustration and longing.

“This is torture,” he gasped in a trembling breath. “Minho...”

“Jisung,” the alpha whined, pressing his forehead against the omega's.

Their breaths mingled in a frenzied rhythm. And through the vibrant bond, Jisung felt everything. The same burn, the same restrained desire, the despair of being so close and yet hindered.

His hand slowly moved up to Minho's neck, brushing the base of his gland, where the skin still throbbed from the mark left by his fangs. And a shock ran through him, so strong that it made him dizzy.

Jisung's breath became shorter, almost trembling. The idea that had just formed terrified him as much as it consumed him. It wasn't revenge, nor even provocation.

If he couldn't be marked and had to endure this frustration until it subsided, then Minho had to share his feelings.

Jisung leaned close to Minho's ear and breathed slowly. “Then... I want you to feel it too.”

His pheromones exploded.

A hot, dense, almost tangible tidal wave that closed in around them.

Minho stifled a cry behind his muzzle, throwing his head back as the chains screamed under the strain. His back arched so hard that Jisung thought it would break for a moment.

The bond between them ignited. Jisung felt the flood coming back—that burning wave that washed over him, that mixture of desire, pain, and pure, animalistic need that was no longer human. But it wasn't enough.

He wanted more.

His gaze still on the alpha's face, he saw something indescribable there. A new light shone in Minho's eyes. It was neither fear nor submission, but rather a fierce and feverish determination. Jisung placed a firm hand on the alpha's chest, just above his heart.

“Look at me,” he whispered hoarsely. 

Minho obeyed. He looked up at Jisung slowly, as if he were afraid that meeting his gaze would reduce everything to ashes. And in his eyes, Jisung saw it all: the struggle, the fever, the pain, but also the love. Raw and uncompromising, needing no words.

Jisung felt every beat of Minho's heart against his palm like an echo of his own. The heat passing from skin to skin was enough to cloud all thoughts.

Jisung felt as if his body no longer belonged to him, as if he were playing a piece he had never learned but knew by heart.

Minho, on the other hand, barely moved. Just a breath, a tremor. His fingers clenched onto Jisung's hips, seeking support, something to hold onto so he wouldn't sink.

Seeing Minho like this—feverish and submissive to desire—shook Jisung's last hesitations. He placed his hands on either side of Minho's jaw, caressing the junction between the skin and the reinforced leather of the muzzle with his thumbs.

The alpha let him, eyes wide open and still fixed on Jisung's.

The omega’s fingers slid slowly along Minho's throat until they came to rest on his collarbones. Minho froze immediately, his muscles tensing at the touch, and his eyes widened as a shiver shook his entire body. 

Jisung sat up slightly, just enough to straddle the alpha's thighs, who gave an involuntary thrust of his hips when he felt the omega's body hovering over his. It was almost imperceptible, yet Minho gasped as if he couldn't breathe. Jisung couldn't help but shiver when he felt the alpha's already hard cock pressing against his butt.

His gaze sought the alpha's, melting into his black pupils filled with desire. The tension between them was palpable in the air, saturated with suffocating pheromones.

Jisung moved closer, melting his body against Minho's and brushing his lips against the thin skin just below the muzzle. A satisfied sigh, more of a moan than a breath, escaped Jisung, and Minho responded with a desperate growl.

His fingers moved up to the base of the alpha's neck, fingertips burning against Minho’s scalp as he firmly grabbed his hair. He gently pulled the alpha's face toward his own, and Minho complied. Their eyes, like two bottomless abysses, never left each other, full of fever and adoration. 

The omega moved his hips against the alpha's crotch, desperate for more of this contact that felt like too little. Jisung wanted more—so much more. He had never felt anything so visceral in his entire life, never desired anything as much as he desired Minho in that moment.

“Can you feel that?” his voice was hoarse, vibrant. “Minho, can you feel what you're doing to me?”

His pheromones turned into an even more desperate fragrance; syrupy and urgent. Minho inhaled deeply, surprised to taste it on his tongue.

“Look what you're doing to me...” Jisung purred, rubbing his butt more deliberately against the alpha's still-covered erection. “Ah– Minho!” His voice almost broke.

A whiny sigh escaped the omega's lips when Minho thrust his hips back. The sight of Minho's body coming to meet his own, demanding, drove Jisung crazy with desire. He felt himself growing wet and cramped in his clothes.

Jisung had never experienced such a strong longing before, a longing that his body sought to satisfy by any means necessary. Yet, his omega was preparing to receive the alpha as if he were in heat. Visceral desire overpowered the little reason and restraint Jisung was trying desperately to hold on to.

He slid a hand against the wet spot blooming between his thighs, his fingers rubbing almost imperceptibly against the alpha's erection, which throbbed with desire at the maneuver. But it was enough to elicit a low growl from Minho, who tried to push the contact away.

Against his fingertips glistened a little of his natural lubricant, forming small, thick strands. Minho stared intently at Jisung's hand, mesmerized, and his breathing suddenly became shorter. His nostrils flared at the powerful scent emanating from it. Jisung watched him, amazed at his effect on Minho.

Suddenly, the omega slipped one of his fingers, soiled with slick, between the grid of the muzzle. Minho reflexively stuck out his tongue to lick the shiny pad of Jisung’s finger. 

The taste blossomed on his tongue, like an explosion of sweet, sugary cotton candy. Addictive. Jisung saw the alpha's pupils dilate, nearly obscuring the dark brown of his irises, and Minho growled. He couldn't get enough; the muzzle prevented him from taking the finger between his lips to lick it clean.

A victorious smile found its way to Jisung's lips, his omega revelling in Minho's torment and knowing he was so desired by this strong yet powerless alpha. His smile, however, was short-lived.

Under the omega's surprised gaze, Minho's fingers grabbed the waistband of Jisung’s pants and pulled so hard that the button popped off with a sharp snap and flew across the cell. “I want you, Jisung. Right now,” he growled, trying in vain to remove the omega's clothing.

Despite the chains limiting their movement, his hands tore the fabric with brute force, shredding the pants and underwear off until Jisung was half-naked. The omega gasped, his entire body trembling under the assault. His cock was already erect, red and glistening with desire.

He couldn't resist. How could he, with Minho looking at him like that? As if he were the most beautiful wonder in the world, the most precious thing. The omega sat up and pressed his hands against Minho's bare chest, tipping him over and keeping him lying down. Next, his trembling thighs framed Minho's muzzled face. 

“Not so fast, Alpha,” he said breathlessly before taking off his shirt and throwing it away.

If he couldn't resist him, he could still drive him crazy. 

Minho barely moved, his body sprawled out on the cold floor of the cell, the chains clanking faintly with each labored breath. His fingers clenched on Jisung's hips, seeking an anchor to keep him from sinking into the madness of desire. The air was heavy with pheromones, an intoxicating mixture of rut and unexpected heat, saturating the confined space.

Perched above the alpha, Jisung hesitated for a moment, scrutinizing Minho's face with his dark eyes. “You're driving me crazy,” he moaned, his voice hoarse with desire. 

He stretched his arm back, his fingers brushing the bulge straining against Minho's pants. This elicited a low growl from Minho, making his cock twitch against the omega's palm.

Then, Jisung slowly lowered himself, aligning himself with the muzzle. The icy touch of metal against the heat of his damp skin made him moan loudly, and he rolled his hips in slow, provocative circles. 

Minho growled wildly, fingers dipping into the meat of the omega’s thighs and crazed eyes fixed on the obscene show unfolding before him. Jisung's pink, throbbing hole slid against his muzzle, spreading its slick in shiny streaks across the steel. He tried to press his nose harder, inhaling the musky, sweet aroma that drove him mad, but the muzzle prevented him from licking, sucking, devouring as his alpha instinct screamed for him to. His hips rose futilely, rock-hard cock throbbing in his pants and beading with precum.

Feasting on the alpha's moans and grunts, Jisung quickened his pace, his round butt bouncing slightly under the force of his movements. “Look how wet I am, Minho! I need you,” he gasped.

Through the fever consuming him, he parted his cheeks with his hands, exposing his glistening, throbbing entrance. A few drops of his slick dripped directly between the bars and brushed against the alpha's lips. Minho inhaled sharply, his body as taut as a bow, as the sweet taste blossomed on his tongue.

Wet sounds filled the cell, obscene; flesh meeting metal beneath Jisung's high-pitched moans and Minho's muffled growls. The omega's thighs clamped around the alpha's face like a vise, controlling him completely as Jisung took more and more, almost indifferent to Minho's desires.

He didn't recognize himself; so fearless and insatiable. He had been told that omegas could become fiery and demanding, but until now, Jisung had never experienced such an irrepressible sensation. His skin tingled, sensitive to the extreme, and his every movement sent waves of heat through his entire body.

It wasn't a simple desire—it was a feverish, instinctive rush. It was visceral and devastating, the beginning of a flash heat triggered by their instincts responding, complementing each other. 

His entire body surrendered, ready and willing for his alpha. In that moment, Jisung lived only to satisfy Minho, finding pleasure only in the idea of pleasing the alpha.

Minho was losing his mind beneath him, his painful erection twitching relentlessly within the confines of his pants. He could already imagine plunging his tongue inside Jisung, licking his sweet nectar until he mewled with pleasure in his arms. In his torment, however, Minho could only feel the omega's heat. His intoxicating scent made him moan with frustration at not being able to taste him to his heart's content while Jisung rode his muzzle, wild and uninhibited. The omega's cock stood proudly between his thighs, glistening with beads of precum that left a few drops on his stomach with each movement.

“Harder...” Jisung almost begged, his nails digging into Minho's scalp. His entire body strained toward an orgasm that seemed to elude him.

His words echoed through the cell like a desperate cry. His fingers wrapped more firmly around Minho's hair and pulled at the dark strands with an almost painful urgency. His body trembled like a leaf, suspended on the edge; each rub against the muzzle sent flashes of pleasure through his veins.

But it was nowhere near enough. The heat and need consuming him demanded much more, demanded the total satisfaction of his alpha.

With a hoarse groan, Jisung slowed his movements, gently releasing his grip on Minho's face with his thighs. Breathless, the omega sat up; his still-throbbing, untouched hole leaving wet, shiny trails on the metal of the muzzle. Seeing the viscous threads still connecting his ass to Minho's muzzle made a crimson hue blossom on Jisung's cheeks.

His eyes, veiled with desire, drifted down to Minho's lower abdomen and fell with longing on the prominent bulge straining the fabric to its limits. The memory of their earlier fleeting contact, of the hard heat beneath his palm, sent a new wave of painful desire surging through Jisung. 

He wanted Minho inside him, had an urgent need to feel him make his way in. However, his instinctive need to satisfy his alpha's every desire was always mixed with the craving to make him experience the same frustration he felt.

His trembling hands slid down the alpha's chest, brushing against sweat-covered skin and nearly faded bruises, until they reached the waistband of his pants. With a feverish gesture, Jisung's trembling fingers slipped just under the elastic to touch the hidden skin. The alpha's body responded to his touch with an involuntary thrust of his hips.

Behind his muzzle, Minho growled, his dark eyes fixed on the omega with an intensity the latter had never seen before. Minho arched his body to facilitate Jisung's movements, and the latter pulled on the fabric, finally freeing the alpha from his prison of clothing. Minho's cock sprang free, standing tall toward the ceiling, thick and reddened from being neglected for so long. Its swollen head was beaded with a trickle of precum that ran down to its base.

Jisung gasped at the obscene sight, his own cock twitching and throbbing between his thighs, hard and aching. “Minho… fuck! You’re so big,” he murmured in a broken voice. His fingers wrapped around the hot, pulsing base as the alpha let out a sigh.

The skin was soft and velvety beneath his palm, yet rigid as steel. The omega pumped slowly, feeling the veins beneath the strokes of his hand. Minho let out a muffled cry, his hips jerking of their own will to meet Jisung's movements against his hardened, weeping cock. 

Seeing the alpha so submissive to his every move, unable to dominate him as his instincts surely screamed at him to do, caused an insatiable fever to take hold of the omega. He leaned forward, still shivering from his own unfinished pleasure, and brought his lips close to Minho's shaft.

The rich, musky scent emanating from it acted as an aphrodisiac, shattering Jisung's remaining limits and patience. He darted his tongue against the flesh, greedily lapping up the salty precum that beaded there. Then he traced slow circles around the sensitive tip, lips and tongue teasing at its slit. Minho shuddered violently under his touch, a wild growl vibrating in his chest as he clenched his fists around the chains on his wrists.

Encouraged by the sounds and reactions he elicited from Minho, Jisung closed his lips around the head. He sucked hard, hollowing his cheeks, reveling in the heat in his mouth. Jisung moaned around the alpha’s cock, the wanton sound filling the cell without any restraint. The omega pressed his hand against Minho's thighs, holding him in place while his tongue lavished his length, traveling down the protruding vein and exploring every inch of the alpha's most intimate part. 

Lost in his own desire, Jisung went even lower, taking more of Minho's length. He forced himself to ignore his gag reflex as his muscles contracted around Minho’s cock in his throat. He preferred to focus on the pleasant weight in his mouth and the heat pulsing between his lips. Minho's taste blossomed on his tongue, salty and musky—totally alpha—fueling the fire within him.

Minho was losing his footing, the muscles of his stomach contracting as he struggled not to come too quickly. He wanted to rip off that damn muzzle and sink his fangs into Jisung's neck before making him scream on his cock. But all he could do was endure Jisung's hot, wet mouth devouring him with mad voracity and watch him, his eyes veiled with pleasure. 

His cheeks hollowed from the suction as the omega swallowed loudly around the alpha's dick, eliciting a long, plaintive moan from Minho. Despite everything, saliva escaped from between Jisung's lips, mingling with the seminal fluid and sliding down the shaft to its base. But the omega did not stop.

Even when his jaws began to tire and tears of pleasure and effort flowed freely down his plump cheeks, he continued. He quickened his pace, his head bobbing up and down with uncontrollable frenzy, his tongue pressing against the sensitive underside of his cock as he swallowed relentlessly. His moans of pleasure were muffled and vibrated against the flesh filling his mouth.

His own desire consumed him. Unconsciously, he rubbed his thighs together, and his wet entrance dripped onto the cold floor. Yet nothing could distract him from his task anymore. He squeezed his fingers around the base of Minho's member, just enough to make him groan louder, while digging his fingers into the alpha's belly with his other hand.

The cell echoed with their sounds: Minho's animalistic growls and the wet smacking of Jisung's saliva-glistening lips against the skin at the base of the alpha's shaft. And suddenly, Minho felt the pressure in his stomach rise inexorably, his orgasm approaching like an unrelenting tidal wave. 

The base of his cock began to swell, a knot already forming beneath the taut, sensitive skin, ready to lock onto his omega. He panicked for a moment, his hands reaching for Jisung's hair. In vain, as the short chains reminded him of their purpose.

“Stop... Jisung, stop!” he growled hoarsely, his voice muffled by the muzzle. His hips jerked in an attempt to break free, but the omega pinned them to the ground with all his strength, growling possessively. “I'm going to come... the knot... you’ll get stuck! Get out of there!”

But Jisung, lost in his feverish passion, ignored all the alpha's warnings. His eyes were glassy, his entire body vibrating with a primal need that drowned out all reason. Without ever pulling away, he shook his head slightly and redoubled his efforts, licking and sucking more eagerly, his throat contracting around the length.

His hands tightened around Minho's muscular thighs, not allowing him to move. He was grateful for the alpha's fatigue because it made it easy for him to hold Minho in place while his lips slid tirelessly along his throbbing cock.

Minho growled louder, in a mixture of frustration and pure pleasure. “Jisung! Stop, damn it–” he begged again, his body writhing against the chains. But the omega didn't care.

The sensation was too intense for the alpha, too perfect. The wet heat, Jisung's insistent tongue... he couldn't hold back the explosion any longer. With a muffled growl, Minho came violently, cum spurting hot and thick down the omega’s throat. Jisung’s lips were at the base of his cock when Minho’s knot swelled fully under his pleasure. Hooked just behind the omega's teeth, locking him in place.

Jisung moaned around the swollen flesh, his own body trembling with an orgasm triggered by being possessed. He was stuck, his jaw stretched around the imposing and throbbing knot. Unable to pull back, trapped around the alpha until the knot subsided. But this realization only fueled his desire. 

Tears streamed down his cheeks, a mixture of pleasure and effort. His nose was pressed against Minho's pelvis, inhaling his musky, chocolaty scent until he was dizzy. This kept him in a hazy state. He could hear the alpha panting above him, his body still shaking from the aftershocks of pleasure. Yet, trapped in this forced intimacy, Jisung had never felt more complete or fulfilled.

The cell fell back into relative silence, broken only by their ragged breaths slowly calming and by Jisung's light, almost reflexive sucking around the alpha cock. Strands of saliva still dripped down his chin and onto the alpha's firm thighs, but Jisung didn't care.

Minho watched Jisung between his legs as best he could. And at that moment, he realized that all the fever and frustration that had plagued him for days had finally subsided. They had been replaced by a possessive satisfaction that overwhelmed him, as if his body, now pleased and marked, had just ceased the battle.

He wanted to stroke Jisung's hair tenderly, to calm him down and help him endure the time he would have to spend like this. But he couldn't move freely. Instead, he growled softly, a sound meant to be proud and soothing.

“You're crazy, Jisung,” he whispered hoarsely. “Fuck– you're perfect.”

Jisung slowly raised his eyes to meet his, his pupils dilated with residual desire, and his cheeks smeared with dried tears. He couldn't respond with words; his mouth was too full, too busy accommodating Minho’s faintly pulsating knot. However, he let out a low moan that vibrated around the alpha’s dick. 

Jisung released the alpha's thighs and slowly moved his hands up his chest, feeling Minho’s taut muscles and heart beating wildly beneath his palm. Jisung pressed his body against Minho's legs, rubbing his warm skin against his and seeking the contact that comforted him in his vulnerability. His own cock, still half-hard and sensitive, brushed against the alpha's thigh, sending a small jolt of pleasure that made him shiver.

Time seemed to slow down. The knot remained firm for what felt like an eternity, ten minutes, maybe fifteen, as their breathing gradually calmed. Minho felt the omega gradually relax against him, his heavy body on top of his. “Rest, my love,” Minho whispered in a deep purr despite the muzzle. “I'm here. Always.”

Jisung responded with a tiny nod, his eyelids fluttering as exhaustion finally caught up with him after the consuming frenzy.

Several long minutes later, the knot began to deflate and the pressure gradually eased. With a wet, obscene pop, Minho's cock slid out of Jisung's mouth, leaving the omega coughing slightly, his throat sore but satisfied. A few drops of cum mixed with saliva dripped from his lips and chin. He wiped them away with the back of his hand before sitting up slightly, his legs wobbly. 

Without a word, he crawled toward Minho, ignoring the exhaustion weighing heavily on his limbs, and collapsed against the alpha's chest. He wrapped his arms tightly around Minho's waist and nestled his head into the crook of his neck to avoid contact with the cold muzzle.

Now that he could, Minho wrapped his arms around Jisung as much as the chains would allow, pressing the omega against him with a protective grip. Their bodies pressed against each other, skin against skin, warmth against warmth, erasing the cold from the cell already warmed by their lovemaking. 

“Come here,” Minho growled softly, resting his chin against Jisung's hair.

He rubbed the omega's back in slow circles, soothing the almost imperceptible tremors of his body. Jisung murmured incoherent words against his skin, muffled “I love you”s, and sighs of contentment, between yawns.

Exhaustion enveloped them like a heavy blanket. Despite the restraints, their bodies intertwined in the most comfortable position possible. Jisung fell asleep first, breathing steadily against Minho's neck and wearing a peaceful smile on his swollen lips. Minho followed close behind, his eyelids closing on a vision of his omega nestled against him, happy and sated.

The cell fell back into a gentle silence, broken only by the calm rhythm of their hearts beating in unison. They fell asleep like this, exhausted but deeply happy in each other's arms, stronger than ever, despite the chains that bound them.

Jisung woke up first, surprised by the warmth surrounding him despite being half-naked. Beneath him, the alpha was still fast asleep, his features finally relaxed. The omega's head rested against his chest, rising and falling to the peaceful rhythm of his breathing.

Blinking, it took Jisung a moment to realize where the gentle warmth was coming from, then he noticed the blanket. Thick, carefully slipped around them, enveloping them like a silent promise. He didn't remember seeing it there before.

A blush spread across the omega's cheeks when he realized that someone must have come to cover them while they slept, naked and exposed. Perhaps one of the guards had taken pity on them, or one of the people who had watched them the night before from the other side of the mirror.

Jisung felt embarrassed as he thought back to the show he must have made while he was no longer even aware of his surroundings. He hoped that the observers had at least had the decency to look away during their lovemaking.

It was only after several long minutes, when his muscles began to remind him of their existence, that Jisung finally decided to move. He sat up slowly, taking care not to wake Minho, and the blanket slipped from his shoulders, revealing his skin, still reddened from the previous day by the alpha's firm grip.

It took him a moment to gather his thoughts; he shouldn’t remember the details of the previous night at the moment. His gaze swept across the room, which seemed different, almost too quiet. That's when he noticed a small pile of neatly folded clothes in the corner of the cell.

His heart sank. They didn't belong to him. These clothes were clean and simple, still carrying the characteristic smell of sanitized laundry. Someone had come and found them like this, he was sure of it now. A shiver of fear ran down his spine as he forced himself to put on the clothes. The cool fabric against his skin accentuated the unease he was trying so hard to contain.

When he was dressed, the cell's reinforced door opened with a creak of metal. Jisung jumped before glancing at Minho; he was still asleep, his face turned away from the light that seemed to disturb him even in his sleep.

When Jisung walked through the door, the two agents from the night before were waiting for him. Neither of them dared to look him in the eye, and Jisung thought he saw one of them blush with embarrassment as he lowered his head. Without so much as a glance, they ordered him to follow them through a maze of corridors.

The office they led him to was anything but welcoming. There were no windows, and everything was gray under the pale light of a neon bulb, including the furniture, which consisted of nothing more than a metal table, three chairs, and a bookcase. The latter was overflowing with files, each thicker than the last.

Behind the table, which served as a desk, a woman seemed to be waiting for him. Dressed in an impeccable uniform, she stood stiffly, her piercing gaze seeming to study him with interest.

Jisung paled when he noticed the nameplate on the desk that read Assistant Director.

“Han Jisung,” she greeted him in a cold voice. “Sit down.”

He obeyed without a word, his trembling fingers hidden under the table.

“You know why you're here.” There was a silence. Then, she placed a file in front of her and slowly opened it. “You have... physically interacted with subject 521D-23 dur-”

“Minho,” Jisung interrupted. She narrowed her eyes in annoyance. “His name is Minho,” he added.

“... with Minho during a rut episode, in violation of the most basic protocols.”

Jisung's throat tightened, and he looked down at his hands. He didn't dare answer.

She calmly continued. “You could have died. That's not bravery, Han Jisung, it's recklessness.” She leaned slightly over the table and locked eyes with the omega. “But the problem is no longer just your recklessness, young man.”

She turned her computer screen toward him, displaying the CCTV footage from the previous day. Jisung saw himself biting the base of Minho's neck, the latter's ecstatic expression... The director pressed the space bar to freeze the video.

“You marked him.” The word echoed in the room, heavy with meaning and irreversible. 

“I– it wasn't... it was instinctive,” Jisung tried to defend himself.

“Of course. What happened next was instinctive too. I won't show you the footage. You won't hold it against me.”

Jisung felt himself blushing, embarrassed and ashamed. They had been seen, filmed and observed like circus animals in their moment of vulnerability.

The silence stretched on. Then the director resumed, lower, softer too. “Listen, what's done is done, Jisung... but do you know what this means? For you, as well as for him?”

Jisung didn't answer, too busy holding back the tears that threatened to spill out. He was suddenly much too sensitive, and he hated it.

“Marking creates a chemical, neurological, and emotional bond. That means you are now this alpha's primary anchor. He will respond to your pheromones before any other stimulus. He will constantly seek you out. You will be the only one able to calm him if he loses control.” She sat up straight, her arms crossed. "Are you ready to take on that responsibility? To vouch for an unstable alpha?"

She looked at him expectantly. 

Jisung, frozen in his chair, felt his heart pound. Tears finally streamed down his cheeks, and his throat burned with everything he wanted to say but couldn't formulate. “Of course I will! Who do you think I am?” he sniffed, wiping his chin with the back of his hand.

The woman stared at him for a long moment, searching for any trace of fear, doubt, or naivety. But all she could see was a determined, stubborn omega, hurt by the question.

She finally sighed slowly, and her face relaxed a little, a hint of a smile appearing on her lips. “I see,” she said simply. “Then let's get on with the paperwork.”

Signatures, supporting documents, fingerprinting... Once the new documents had been added to the file, she closed it with a sharp snap. The director remained motionless for a moment, her hands clasped over the cardboard cover as she watched the omega cautiously. After a few seconds, she continued in a measured but serious voice. 

“A few words of advice for you, Han Jisung: First, be measured in your emotions and reactions. An alpha who has just been marked is very sensitive to mood swings in his anchor. He will also be very protective, even possessive of you, so avoid having visitors for a while,” she smiled softly, seeing that the omega was more than attentive to her words. “Finally, don't let him isolate himself or shut himself off. To a lesser extent, you will also sense his general mood. Don't hesitate to release some pheromones to calm him down if you feel he is confused, agitated, or afraid.”

Jisung nodded, indicating that he understood. The director then stood, picking up the file from the table and putting it away on a shelf in the bookcase.

“His release papers will probably be ready later today. He no longer seems to pose an immediate danger, but we'll have to run a few tests on him anyway. We'll let you know as soon as he's transferred to your home.”

“M-my home...?” Jisung repeated, surprised.

She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. “The bond requires your mutual presence until Minho stabilizes. But we can transfer him to his home if you prefer to live there.”

Jisung looked down, and his cheeks flushed red. “I understand. His place will be fine then.”

The director gave him one last look, halfway between compassion and amusement. “Well, I wish you luck. You should go home and rest. We'll pass the information on to Minho,” she said, before escorting him out of her office.

He was not allowed to return to Minho, who was apparently already undergoing a battery of tests to confirm his fitness for release.

When Jisung left the center, the daylight seemed unreal, almost aggressive after having spent the day and night without seeing the sky. He couldn't imagine Minho's reaction when he finally emerges after spending most of his time locked up there.

The sky was pale gray now that winter was approaching, and the drizzle fell on him as if to erase the hours spent within those concrete walls. 

The omega walked aimlessly for a while, unable to think of anything but Minho and his joy at finally finding him again. Jisung remembered how thin the alpha had become, surely starved from his days of suffering in isolation, so he stopped at the supermarket on his way to pick up ingredients to prepare a nice meal for Minho's return.

The steady hum of the neon lights and the store’s background music seemed almost foreign to him, as if part of him had been left behind. Everything seemed too loud, too alive after the hushed silence that prevailed at the center. 

Jisung wandered between the aisles for a moment, his fingers mechanically skimming the labels—noodles, tofu, samgyupsal, sesame oil. He didn't even know what Minho would like to eat. Yet, he found himself with a bursting basket full of ingredients he knew were comforting, which they sometimes shared before. 

By the time he left the store, the drizzle had turned to rain. Jisung quickened his pace, clutching the grocery bag to his chest like a treasure. The walk home was almost breathless, and the omega arrived at Minho's house just as the streetlights began to turn on.

Putting the bags on the kitchen counter, Jisung finally allowed himself to breathe. The familiar little house seemed empty to him. The neutral smell of the place contrasted sharply with the stifling smell of the cell, yet Jisung had never associated any particular smell with the house before. Now that he knew Minho's scent, however, its absence within his own four walls was overwhelming.

The omega ran a hand through his hair and made a mental note to take a shower after cooking before getting started.

Jisung had just put the kettle on when his phone vibrated on the counter. The screen lit up, displaying a message from an unknown number. His heart skipped a beat as he grabbed his phone.

Transfer of subject 521D-23 (isolation, unit K)
Transfer to civilian area in progress.
Please prepare the reception area in accordance with integration protocol.
Estimated arrival in two hours and sixteen minutes.

He had to reread the message three times before he understood what it said. The words “reception area” sounded strange. It took him a moment to realize that they were talking about transferring him to his home—their home.

Jisung stood motionless for a long time, the phone clenched between his trembling fingers. The message’s content echoed in his mind, over and over again. He felt a lump form in his throat.

Two hours. Just two hours before Minho walked through the door again, without chains, without supervision.

Mechanically, the omega put away the groceries he wouldn’t use for the meal, trying to keep his hands busy to stifle the turmoil inside him. Everything had to be ready, perfect even, so that Minho could finally feel at home. But the more he busied himself, the more his mind drifted to Minho and their newfound bond.

Time stretched strangely. The rain outside had intensified, pelting against the windows, and Jisung thought back to the prison cell. To the cold, the muzzle on Minho's face. He remembered the way Minho had said his name... and his heart tightened even more.

When the clock struck seven, Jisung realized he had been staring at the door for several minutes. He jumped up, wiping his sweaty hands on his pants, and went to turn on the living room lights. It was a trivial, almost absurd gesture, but in this context, it seemed far too important to the omega.

A faint beeping sound suddenly made him jump. A vehicle was pulling up in front of the house, and Jisung forced himself to breathe slowly. He went to the kitchen window and saw the dark silhouette of a transport van and the uniformed agents on the sidewalk.

A few moments later, there was a soft knock at the door. Two agents from the center were there, flanking a figure he recognized instantly despite the hood covering his head.

Minho.

The alpha still seemed a little unsteady when they entered the house. His eyes adjusted to the dim light bathing the house, and he looked relieved when his hood was removed.

Jisung stifled a gasp of surprise. The alpha's features were still obscured by a muzzle. It was much more discreet and less dehumanizing than the one he wore in detention, but it was still present on his thin face. Nevertheless, Minho seemed calm, almost peaceful. And when his eyes met the omega's, they sparkled with joy.

“Mr. Han,” one of the agents announced in a neutral voice. “The subject is being released into your custody. You are responsible for his care from now on.”

Jisung nodded, unable to take his eyes off Minho.

“Here are his papers,” the other agent added, handing Jisung a document folder. “And you'll need to sign the transfer report, then we can let him with you.”

Jisung didn't need to be asked twice, hastily signing the documents and putting the copy the agent returned to him in Minho's folder. The agents nodded vaguely in greeting before turning toward the exit.

“Wait!” Jisung exclaimed.

With his hand on the door handle, one of the officers froze. Then, they both turned around.

“I... how do I...” Jisung pointed to his own mouth, then to Minho's muzzle.

“Ah! The lock is fingerprint-activated, only you can remove it. The director was very clear about that,” the agent replied before they both left for good.

The door closed behind them, and silence fell over the house.

Minho stood motionless for a moment at the living room threshold, leaning awkwardly against the entrance hall cabinet to keep his balance. Their eyes locked, heavy with emotions too complex to put into words.

Jisung felt his heart sink, his stomach knot up: they were alone.

Truly alone.

The omega took a hesitant step forward, his fingers reaching out toward the alpha. “You... I'm going to take that off,” he whispered, as if afraid of breaking the spell by speaking.

Minho nodded slowly. Still a little stiff, he moved forward and tilted his head slightly to allow the omega access to the clasp of his muzzle.

Jisung's fingers trembled as they touched the cold edge of the mechanism. A quiet click sounded, and the clasp unlocked beneath his skin. The barely audible sound resonated throughout his entire being.

The muzzle slid gently away, and Minho took a deep breath. The air left his lungs unhindered in a hoarse, almost soothing sigh.

Jisung stood there, his fingers still hovering a few inches from the alpha's face, his heart pounding. The silence grew thicker, but it was no longer the silence within the center’s walls. It was comfortable, alive in a way. 

Minho's eyes lingered on Jisung, as if he couldn't believe he was really there, within reach. His lips parted, perhaps to speak, but no words came out. Instead, a simple, shy, but sincere smile lit up his face.

Jisung felt the heat rise to his cheeks. “You breathe better like that...” he whispered, his voice softer than he would have liked, as he lowered his hand and followed it with his eyes.

The alpha nodded. He looked exhausted yet serene. Jisung gestured toward the sofa. 

“Sit down. I'll get you something to drink and eat.”

Minho obeyed without a word, crossing the room with clumsy steps. When he sat down, he sighed again, with such a relief that Jisung felt something relax in his chest.

The omega walked away toward the kitchen, trying his best to hide the emotion tightening his throat. The clinking of the glass against the countertop, the aroma of the food: everything seemed strangely familiar, ordinary. 

But this was no longer a mundane, everyday occurrence. Every gesture seemed charged with a completely new meaning. They were no longer the same. They were still Jisung and Minho, but they had changed.

When the omega returned to the living room, Minho had closed his eyes, his head leaning slightly against the back of the chair. His features, finally relaxed, seemed softer. Jisung set the tray on the table, hesitated for a moment, then sat down gently beside him. Just close enough for Minho to feel his presence and warmth.

A comfortable silence settled in, punctuated only by the alpha’s steady breathing as he nibbled at his food and the discreet patter of rain against the windows. The world seemed to exist only here, tightened around them in this safe space.

Jisung finally dared to move a little closer to Minho, his thigh brushing against his. He felt the fabric against his knee and the soft warmth of the alpha's body beneath it.

The latter turned his face toward him, his eyes surprised, but did not move any further. Their gazes met, and the omega could see an expression of tenderness mixed with gratitude on the alpha’s face. Then, in an almost unconscious gesture, Minho placed his hand on Jisung's. The contact was light, almost imperceptible, but it was worth all the words in the world.

Jisung's throat tightened. He wanted to speak, to say something—anything—but the words refused to come. So he just stayed there, his hand under Minho's, his gaze lost in the soft living room light while the alpha finished eating.

When he was done, Minho slowly put down his spoon, his gaze fixed on his half-empty plate. Jisung didn't know whether to speak or wait. The air between them still vibrated with a gentle tension, a silence that called for neither apologies nor explanations.

Finally, it was Minho who broke the calm. His voice was hoarse, as if he hadn't spoken in days. “You shouldn't have come.”

Jisung looked up, a crease appearing between his eyebrows. “I couldn't not come! You needed me.”

A long silence stretched out, and Minho smiled wearily. “I didn't want to... scare you. Or hurt you.”

“I know. You didn't scare me,” the omega replied in a whisper.

Minho stared at him for a moment, his dark eyes shining with emotion he seemed barely able to contain. 

“You know, back there... I don't remember much. At one point, though, your scent… I could smell you,” he squeezed Jisung's hand in his. "I thought I was going crazy. I was hearing your name in my head, all the time. All I could think about was you. And when I saw you in the cell...“ he paused, breathless. ”I was afraid I had made you up."

Jisung felt his throat tighten. “You didn't,” he said simply. “I was there.”

“You should hate me.”

The omega frowned. “Why would I do that?”

“Because it's dangerous. I'm dangerous. Because now you're bound to someone who almost...” He stopped, unable to finish his sentence.

“Minho. Look at me.” 

His shoulders tensed when Jisung put his hand on his forearm. But he slowly obeyed. The omega's expression had softened.

“You never scared me. Even back there. Despite the rut, it was you I saw, not a monster.”

The silence that followed was charged with emotion. Their eyes met, and it was as if something obvious had unfolded between them. Everything they had never dared to say took shape in that suspended moment.

“To tell you the truth...” Jisung dared a shy smile. “I think I loved you long before I understood what I was. Maybe even before I knew what you were.”

Minho's breath caught in his throat. And Jisung looked away, suddenly ashamed, his cheeks blooming with pink.

“I know it's silly. This is definitely not the time. But now, after everything that happened... when you asked me to mark you, it was so obvious to me… I think I’ve always hoped to be an omega so I could protect you…”

A long silence followed. Then, very gently, Minho brought Jisung's hand to his cheek. His skin was warm, his gaze too full of emotion to hold. “It's not silly,” he said. “That's how I felt too.” A small, nervous laugh escaped the omega, who seemed embarrassed. The tension of the room seemed to lift, and Minho smiled as he reached out and placed his hand onto Jisung's waist. “Come here,” he said softly.

Without thinking twice, Jisung moved closer. He felt the alpha's arms close around him. Hesitant at first, they became more confident. The familiar warmth, the rhythm of heartbeat against his cheek, and the scent he would now recognize anywhere... it all overwhelmed him at once.

“I missed you,” he whimpered, his voice muffled against the alpha's chest, and the latter tightened his embrace.

“Me too, Jisung. You have no idea.”

They stayed like that for a long time, without speaking, just breathing together, nestled in each other's arms. The walls seemed to fade away around them.

When Jisung lifted his head, their faces were close together. Minho smiled slightly—timidly and uncertainly. Their eyes sought each other out, and then, as if it were obvious, their lips brushed against each other. A light kiss, barely a breath. Neither passionate nor impatient, just the promise of starting over together.

The kiss ended with a breath, like blowing out a candle, the warmth lingering for a few moments. Jisung kept his eyes closed, relishing the embrace of the moment, Minho's breath against his lips. 

When he opened his eyes again, Minho was already looking at him, a tired but sincere smile on his lips. Their foreheads touched, and life resumed around them. The rain against the windows, the quiet warmth of the living room, and the soft lights. 

Nothing had changed. Everything was different.

Suddenly, fatigue fell upon Minho. Jisung noticed immediately: his shoulders had slumped, and his eyelids were struggling to stay open.

"You should go rest,“ the omega whispered softly. ”Come on, the bedroom is ready."

The alpha hesitated only briefly. Hand in hand, they climbed the stairs in an almost solemn silence, each step echoing like a memory. 

It was strange. They had slept together dozens of times before, in the familiar chaos of their friendship. But this time, nothing was the same—for the better. Everything they had done dozens or hundreds of times before felt like the first time. Each gesture took on a new meaning they couldn't yet name.

The light in the bedroom was soft. Minho stopped near the bed, his hand brushing the sheet. Jisung, a little nervous, looked away and began to take off his jacket. Gestures that had been so ordinary until then—taking off a shirt, placing the folded clothes on the chair—suddenly seemed tinged with a new modesty.

When he turned around, he met Minho's gaze. The alpha was sitting shirtless on the edge of the bed. The red mark on his neck, at the base of his throat, seemed to pulse softly like a desperate call.

The smell of chocolate wafted gently through the room, muffled and sweet, and Jisung felt his breath catch in his chest. The day before, he hadn't really seen the mark he had left, too absorbed in other things to pay attention. Without thinking, he moved closer. His hand rose of its own accord, hovering a few millimeters from the skin. 

Minho didn't move, his chocolate eyes deeply anchored in Jisung’s. Something passed between them, a vibration under the skin, burning with a desire not only physical, but also emotional. The desire to belong completely to each other.

Jisung felt himself wavering. An uncontrollable, visceral heat rose within him, imbued with infinite tenderness. His pheromones rose into the air, timid yet desperately frank, and his cheeks flushed red. He turned his face away.

“I...” His voice caught in his throat. “Sorry.”

Minho didn't answer right away. Instead, he only reached out and brushed his fingertips against the omega's jaw, encouraging him to look at him again. A gentle, almost reverent touch. Despite his tiredness, his dark eyes shone with such raw emotion that Jisung's breath caught in his throat.

“You don't have to apologize,” he whispered hoarsely. “You smell so good, Jisung.”

Those words had the effect of a caress, and the omega felt his heart beat wildly. Minho sat him down next to him and leaned toward him, brushing his lips with a slow and painfully tender kiss.

It was very different from the earlier kiss, more intimate, more fragile too. Their breath mingled, and Jisung responded by leaning into him.

When their lips parted, Minho placed a series of kisses on his temples and forehead. On the discreet lines of the omega's marks. “Your marks...” he whispered against his skin. “They're beautiful. You're beautiful, all of you.”

Jisung trembled at his words, sliding his fingers through the alpha's hair as his only response. They fell side by side onto the sheets, and Minho's fingers found their place at the omega's waist. The alpha kissed his cheek, then the column of his throat, before gently sucking on the swollen skin at the base of Jisung's neck, almost tasting the sweetness of his pheromones on his tongue.

“Alpha—” Jisung moaned, digging his fingers into Minho's neck to hold him close. “Please, Minho, mark me.”

Jisung's words floated in the air, laden with a vulnerability that made the alpha vibrate deep inside, sensitive to his every desire. Still bearing the sweet taste of the omega's skin on his lips, Minho lifted his head, seeking Jisung's. In them shone an absolute confidence that overwhelmed him.

“Jisung...” he whispered, caressing the omega's flushed cheek. “Are you sure?”

The omega nodded, his trembling fingers tightening in the alpha's hair. The alpha pulled Jisung closer, their bodies nestling together, and kissed the thin, sensitive skin near the omega's neck again.

A shiver ran through Jisung's body, and he closed his eyes. Minho's warmth was tender, protective, as he bit into his flesh with deliberate slowness. With instinctive precision, the alpha's fangs pierced the skin just enough to draw blood and leave a mark, and Jisung stifled a moan. His entire body arched against Minho, and the pain quickly dissolved into pleasure. 

Jisung's pheromones exploded into the room in response to their bond, sweet and intoxicating, blending harmoniously with Minho's. Tears welled up in the omega's eyes, and his moans turned into hot sighs.

Jisung lifted Minho's face and pressed his lips against his in a sensual kiss, while exploring the alpha’s muscular back with his hands. Their tongues met in a languid yet tender dance, the alpha's fingers tightening around Jisung's slim waist before moving up his side.

Pressed against him, the omega writhed under his touch, sighing against his lips. The alpha's hands moved lower, sliding along his covered hip before gently brushing his bare thigh. Jisung broke the kiss to catch his breath, trembling with desire against Minho as he looked directly into his eyes.

“Touch me,” Jisung moaned, his nails scratching the alpha's shoulders.

Minho couldn't hold back the growl that rolled through his chest at Jisung's pleading tone. With fluid movements, he removed their underwear and pulled the sheet over them. He settled behind the omega, their naked bodies touching. Jisung's warmth was intoxicating, his powdery scent mingling with the excitement saturating the air.

Jisung melted against Minho, his butt pressing against the alpha's erection as the latter slid a hand between the omega's thighs. His fingers brushed Jisung’s taint before finding his already wet entrance and caressing it tenderly, drawing a sharp moan from the omega.

“Ah! Please, Minho...” he begged, his voice breaking with need.

The alpha responded by inserting one finger, then a second. He moved slowly, carefully checking if his omega was ready to receive him. When he withdrew, Jisung moaned in frustration, tears streaming from the corners of his eyes.

“I know, sweetheart. I'm coming,” he whispered against Jisung’s neck before kissing his skin.

He positioned his cock at the entrance, rubbing gently against the sensitive skin. Then, in one smooth motion, he pushed inside, inch by inch, until he possessed him completely.

A rush of pleasure shot through them like an electric current, making them moan in unison. Wrapping one arm around Jisung's waist, Minho remained still to let him get used to the sensation. 

“You're so perfect, Jisung,” he whispered. 

Jisung turned his head as best he could, seeking Minho's lips in a clumsy but passionate kiss. “Move... please, Alpha,” he moaned into his mouth.

Minho obeyed, beginning to undulate his hips in a slow, deliberate motion that grazed Jisung’s sensitive spot. The omega clung to Minho's arm, his nails pressing crescent into his skin. The rhythm was intimate, almost lazy, but the emotional rush of the recent marking made the pleasure rise inexorably.

The room filled with their mingled breaths and muffled moans. Minho picked up the pace slightly, his thrusts becoming more assertive yet still tender. He slid a hand down, closing it around the omega's erect cock, stroking it in time with his movements and eliciting cries of pleasure from Jisung.

“I love you so much,” the omega babbled, his body arching as he neared ecstasy.

Minho then kissed the throbbing mark, and that was enough. With a heart-wrenching cry of pleasure, Jisung contracted around Minho, his orgasm washing over him in powerful waves as he came onto the alpha's fingers.

Minho followed closely behind, his thrusts becoming more disordered as he came in turn, filling Jisung with his warmth as their bodies were stuck around Minho's knot.

Still buried inside Jisung, Minho kissed his shoulder and neck as the pleasure ebbed away. “I love you too, so much.”

Jisung let out a sigh of contentment. Exhausted and complete, he snuggled more comfortably against the alpha, a peaceful smile on his lips. The bond between them vibrated with sweetness, warm and reassuring.

“Rest, Jisung. I'm here,” Minho whispered against his damp skin. “I'm here.”

And there, still locked together by Minho’s knot, they fell asleep together. The alpha had never felt such peace. And even though he still didn’t know what tomorrow would bring, he didn’t care. For he never felt more human than when his arms were closed around Jisung.

‘It will be okay’ he thought as sleep overtook him. Because he is Jisung’s and Jisung is his. He didn’t care about losing himself along the way, because the omega—his omega—would forever bring him back to the surface.

Minho, 

A little bird found your address for me. I'm so happy your omega kept his promise and that you're living with him now.

Here, life is calm, only punctuated by the rhythm of tides and the sound of the waves, and i love it. I am doing fine, we are doing fine. It's not just Jisung who knows how to keep promises.

Let's live happily, Minho Hyung! 

Oh, and congratulations on your future baby! 

Placing back the card on the table, Minho laughed softly, a smile tugging on the corner of his lips. 

“What’s making you this happy?” Jisung chirped from the kitchen.

The omega then appeared next to Minho, a hand placed under his round belly to help support the weight. The alpha grabbed him tenderly by his waist, moving him closer to land a kiss just above Jisung’s bellybutton.

“Just news from a friend,” he answered before scooping the omega into his arms.

Jisung yelped as his feet left the ground, pouting as Minho carried him to the sofa. “Minho! The baby isn’t happy!”

“Baby will relax while I cook dinner,” Minho just responded, planting a kiss on the omega’s forehead then heading up to the kitchen.

“I am not– I wasn’t talking about me!” Jisung grumbled from the living room, making the alpha laugh as he imagined the pout on his face.

“Sure, whatever makes you happy!”